Journalism

Metro piece

My Fringe started well this year with Michael Billington in the Guardian accusing my show, Talking Cock of single-handedly destroying the International Festival. Apparently because I have written something with a minor swear-word in the title, the Janacek string quartet is going to be put out of business. If I had known it would be so easy to eradicate classical music I would have done this years ago. Does anyone know what the secret of the snuffing out of opera is? It can’t be blasphemy, because I did that last Edinburgh and yet opera has somehow survived. One day, though, I am sure all culture will fall before the mighty weapon of my meticulously researched one-man shows incorporating high and low-brow references and humanist principles.
The great thing about the Edinburgh experience is that both the Janacek String Quartet and my show can co-exist side by side and that perhaps even the same person could attend and enjoy both events. What? Someone could like classical music and knob gags? Surely they have to choose one or the other? No. I’m telling you, reader, they don’t. You are allowed to see both. If anything is killing the International Festival it is self-important, curmudgeonly, elitist, prigs like Billington who try to argue that one cultural experience is more valid than another.
If the Festival is losing ground to the Fringe then it has to make itself more, not less accessible. It has to convince ordinary people that they might actually enjoy an evening of opera (a job being done admirably by the Jerry Springer Opera).
How about a show next year where the boys from Puppetry of the Penis twist Michael Billington’s severed genitals into a caricature of his own oily, smug face, whilst accompanied by the Janacek String Quartet? I’d buy a ticket.