Taken throughout this month. Most of the leaves on the trees are gone by now but there were some beautiful images waiting to be taken.
I was walking down to Central Station when I happened upon this amazing sunset:
This was in Davidshalltorget, just a pile of leaves by an apartment building:
At a shop just off of Stortorget:
And one more – in the little park behind the Stadsbiblioteket:
Soon the skies get grayer and darker… **brrrr**
I work as a theatre director and my abiding interest in everything I’ve done is to show real honesty and grit that people can relate to, no matter how fantastic the subject matter. But I get the feeling having been here in southern Sweden that within theatre, the Swedes haven’t quite got the concept of grit down. Or, they are embarrassed to show it.
Here are some examples. In the past month I’ve seen Swedish versions of the musical CABARET, the play adaptation of OF MICE AND MEN and Arthur Miller’s THE CRUCIBLE. I’ve had the opportunity to see all of these in English so I knew what to expect. All of them have incredibly dark themes in common – outright sexual experimentation and the rise of fascism, the Great Depression and a total lack of work, religious puritanism and victimization of women. All fine and good – but all the shows were trained of anything gritty. THE CRUCIBLE was reset into the mid-20th century – all shadows and stark locations but no sign of the incredibly harsh lives the characters had to live. OF MICE AND MEN had a set of platforms and clean wood lines but no dust or sign of hand-to-mouth existences. CABARET showed some nice signs of the sexuality underneath it all but was lost in a muddle of minimal staging, sets and lighting. I always feel the production design has to give you some element of what these pieces are trying to get across, not to disguise them with minimalism and a lagom-ish sense of keeping things average.
What has been your experience of theatre in Sweden, similar to mine?
I’m flattered to have been invited by The Local to set up a blog about my adventures in downtown Malmö. Well done, The Local, for recognising such talent.
Ten things you need to know about me: