Murakami\’s coming-of-age novel dominated by prose detailing the thoughts of a wandering teenage boy has come to the big screen, and by necessity the thought-based book has been translated into a much quieter piece of cinema. With the exception of the odd voiceover we rarely delve into Watanabe\’s mind, instead we are introduced to his character as if we had known him for years. The drama begins immediately with the story\’s influential suicide from which most of the film\’s tension can be traced.

\’Drama\’ is definitely the right word. Perhaps it was the age at which I read the novel, or the state of mind I was in at the time, but I always remembered this one to be at least mildly uplifting in its affirmation of living. The beauty of one\’s youthful years, the power of simple music – these are the type of things that resonated with me when I read Norwegian Wood. You\’d be forgiven for expecting something similar from the film\’s stills – its sets and scenery are quite remarkable. I never realised how stunningly green and vast Japan\’s countryside is, and here we soak it up through the seasons. Add this to the youthful faces on screen, all gifted with the smoothest of skin and the most entrancing of smiles: the visuals are truly in the territory of the divine.

And yet the tone, again, is surprisingly dark. I stress that I need to revisit the novel, because whilst it is undoubtedly true that other Murakami works set around sexual relationships are often solemn, I remembered Norwegian Wood to be a lot less heavy in that respect. Here, however, the pain is clear and real. Watanabe finds himself in a situation where he truly loves a sweet but mentally fragile woman living outside of Tokyo whilst he studies part-time in the city. However, he is similarly warmed by another girl he comes across who is, in contrast, free from emotional trauma. For reasons related to his past, his loyalties lie with the former, but without any suggestion of egoism or cold-heartedness he finds himself wedged between the two, unsure of what he himself wants out of the unstable situation.

The sexual encounters and overtones are as frequent and intense as I expected, and the intimacy between the characters is conveyed surprisingly well. When the credits roll, however, and that beautiful Beatles song starts playing, it feels strangely out of place, even if it shares a name with the film and is the inspiration for its title. The song feels too full of joy for what we have seen, even if it\’s obvious how apt the lyrics are. The song, novel and film all centre around cryptic women, and all are beautiful and reflective in their own right. It is the film, however, that cuts deeper and is cinema at its very best, capable of combining dialogue, song and image into an overpowering whole.

 

Zadok the Priest blares from all corners of the stage. King Charles (aka Charles Costa) and his sister Wednesday (aka Claudia) stand side by side, arms extended, letting the healing powers of the music flow over them. Once Charles picks up the guitar, all theatrical gimmicks fade as the music takes over. He sure knows his way around a guitar or three. Taking time to remove and replace a piece of clothing between each Van Halen-esque solo, he delights the crowd and their endless attempts to capture him on camera.

Despite having found four new band members – the last time I saw Charles he was alone with his guitar and his tower of hair – King Charles\’ music hasn\’t lost any of its intimacy. Singing about love, the inevitability of death, polar bears, and crocodiles, he still draws the audience in. Each song skits from folk to country via blues, without ever becoming predictable. Although it\’s difficult to pinpoint the direction of his music as he MCs, sings and laughs throughout, his intensity is never lost.

Responding to an anonymous \”we want another song\” from a distinctly \’Oxford\’ voice in the crowd, he resurrects Billy Joel in his last song, We Didn\’t Start the Fire. The whole crowd is jumping and jiving and ignoring the creaking moans of the Tavern\’s not so sturdy floor. Lyrics such as \”Labour government, you\’ve embarrassed us all\” demonstrate the musician\’s political edge, who name-checks a long list of celebrities and current affairs in his anthem to the noughties.

It has to be said that the live King Charles puts his Myspace doppelgänger to shame, breathing life into songs that sound disjointed and confused online. The energy in his music is inescapable: his jangly guitar riffs and heart-warming tales of woe remind me of a new Devendra Banhart, one diagnosed with the best kind of ADHD. If you haven\’t seen The King yet, don\’t waste another second. Let this mass of hair and creativity bowl you over in a live explosion of rap and roaring psychedelic hippy folk.

 

It seems that ballet has recently become ‘à la mode\’ with the continued success of Black Swan at both the box office and awards ceremonies, a new series called Agony & Ecstasy: A Year With English National Ballet being broadcast during prime time (Tuesdays 9pm BBC4), and Adrian Edmondson reaching the final of Let\’s Dance for Comic Relief with his rendition of Fokine\’s The Dying Swan (a short ballet composed in 1905). This level of exposure is rather unusual as ballet is an art form often perceived to be elitist. However, it is by no means unprecedented as any fan of Billy Elliot might tell you.

Whatever all this means for the future of ballet itself there does seem to be one common thread linking each of these programmes and films to greater and lesser extents – the ubiquitous presence of Tchaikovsky\’s Swan Lake. It seems therefore no coincidence that the BBC\’s new series chose Tchaikovsky\’s first ballet as the focus of their opening episode when it has already attracted and maintained such interest. But why has this one masterpiece reached such giddy heights in the public consciousness while others are left virtually unknown?

One reason is the music. Used continually in adverts and film soundtracks, Tchaikovsky has such a distinctive sound that even someone who was convinced that they were completely ignorant about classical music could recognise his works. The score is a roller coaster of emotion and unforgettable melodies which lay siege to the senses, yet at the premiere in 1877 it was condemned as too innovative and too involved for dance. In fact the first few versions of the ballet were subject to a great deal of negative criticism and Tchaikovsky died believing that it was a failure.

Of course the demanding choreography which showcases the whole company and truly allows the principal dancers to perfect their technique also accounts for much of Swan Lake\’s success. The physical and mental endurance needed to complete the ballet with the impression of effortlessness is extraordinary. Only the best dancers undertake the main roles, pulling in large audiences with the promise of a polished performance.

Furthermore, the entertainment provided by the extravaganza and spectacle afforded by Swan Lake also ensures its popularity. Various effects have been used over the years to create the magical transformations and enchanted lake which the plot demands. The large cast offers a diverse range of costumes and the costumes worn by the swans epitomise classical ballet and easily differentiate it from other works such as The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty which also have Tchaikovsky scores and wonderful choreography. The doubled and contrasting costumes of Odette and Odile – the White and Black swans – make the ballet recognisable at first sight, even to those who have never seen a performance of it.

Yet, I believe that all these features which delight and entrance audiences have been less important in capturing the attention of the wider public and ensuring its place in popular culture than the story. Narrative ballet has always been more appealing to the layman than, say, abstract dance and, in addition, Swan Lake has the advantage of being based on a simple fairy tale. The story follows the basic folklore tradition and is familiar to even the very young with its blend of magic, forbidden love and tragic death. The presence of the swans who inhabit the most iconic scenes naturalises the lack of speech and expression of narrative through movement; two features often cited as reasons why ballet does not in general appeal to as wide an audience as theatre or cinema.

Swan Lake, therefore, has all the hallmarks of a great classical ballet of the 19th century and forms a great introduction to art form for the uninitiated. Since its initial lack of success, it has been held as a central part of the balletic repertoire and has come to occupy a special place in the hearts of many, including young girls enticed to ballet classes by white tutus, feathers and tiaras. These young girls ensure the continuation of ballet as a prominent form of dance and an integral part of our rich culture.

Tim Key is lost in one of Brighton\’s many one-way systems when he answers my phone call. A self-confessed ‘shambles\’, such an incident seems perfectly fitting for Key. But one should be wary of underestimating the poet-comedian, as he has taken the comedy world by storm over the past couple of years with his niche, nuanced persona channelled through the medium of his uniquely unassuming poetry. Key has brought a whole new interpretation through his fusion of comedy and poetry, and has developed a unique wit which conveys hilarity whether in performance or in writing. Despite his recent flurry of success, Key is affable and more than approachable on the phone, though he is initially guarded, not aware of the name of the publication and ‘worried I had done something wrong to somewhere called Cherwell\’. Key is just under halfway through the tour of his award winning show, The Slut Cracker, and admits that he was naturally pessimistic about it, as he has never toured before. He began ‘just assuming that it would be absolute horseshit\’, but so far it\’s all gone well.

Despite his heightened recognition and success, Key insists that the nature of his work has really not changed that much. ‘It\’s been really similar; a mixture of stuff that I work on my own projects along with my usual collaborations with people like Mark Watson and Tom Basden and once or twice someone asks you to do something special but broadly it has stayed the same\’. However, winning the Edinburgh Comedy Award back in 2009 has certainly increased his opportunities: ‘The main difference is that show had a life after Edinburgh, which the other show hadn\’t, meaning it has been the first time I have been able to tour really\’. Touring is just one of the many fields into which Key has delved, with his CV including poet, comedian, writer and recording artist. When asked about the breadth of his work, he has a laid back, logical approach to his various crafts, insisting that such variety is essential to the continuation of his work. ‘If you\’re backstage waiting to go onto a gig, you kind of think, \”Why do I put myself through this, why don\’t I just stick to writing?\” And then you think, \”Well, I can\’t think what to write, so then I think I\’ll just go along and do some acting\”.\’

Key begins to analogise the variety of his work. ‘You start off with lots of different fingers in lots of different pies, and then gradually as you move through your career you get each of the pies being slightly more succulent and thus slightly more interesting things in each field\’. Key\’s characteristic faux-scepticism is shown when he describes these fields as ‘a fabric of exit options\’. When pressed to name his preferred medium or piece of work to date, however, he insists that there are no such easy conclusions to be made. ‘I absolutely adore the show I\’m doing at the moment… I\’m lucky in that I work with the people I want to be working with on the projects that I actually enjoy\’.

It is his poetry which defines his career, as this is the medium through which Key channels his witty observations of the world. He talks me through his creative process, though he admits it is a loosely structured one. ‘The main thing about it is that it\’s very throw-away I suppose, and I don\’t put too much thought into it; so it comes down to the little bits and pieces which come to mind and I just whack them down\’. He points to his unique poetic form as ‘the prism that I put these ideas through,\’ and likens it to drawing, stating that ‘I just do a little sketch alone in a café.\’ The striking feature of his poems is their paradoxical nature of at once having such a casual air and yet, particularly in his performances, making one sure that a significant amount of veiled thought is bubbling away. Key admits, ‘I guess there\’s quite a lot of quality control, but then the result of that is that I\’m performing something which is also throw-away.\’

A distinguishing feature of his poetry has always been his ability at once to envisage ridiculous characterisations and parodies of eminent figures in society – as in his poem Politicians – and yet also to revel in the polar opposite of this in the anonymity of characters such as ‘Amanda in HR\’ or ‘The Banker\’. Key warms to this: ‘That\’s a good description of what I actually do; I like a kind of variety.\’ He admits that ‘one or two that are more recognisable,\’ such as his use of the Milibands – ‘they ate their little yoghurts they\’d stowed in their little briefcases\’ – but that ‘the bread and butter is the ordinary going about their daily lives.\’ When asked whether his observance of the farcical nature of the mundane world reflects his actual world view, Key admits that, ‘I do find it funny, to be honest. I guess I\’m slightly more alert to it.\’

Such a large part of Key\’s recognisability comes through the performance aspect of his poetry, in shows such as Charlie Brooker\’s Newswipe and Screenwipe. Measured glances, and witty, almost inaudible asides have defined Key\’s performances, and one could imagine the process of perfecting such a technique takes considerable time and effort. Key, however, maintains that it takes just ‘two or three takes for each… I just do it the best I can.\’ He explains, ‘The director has a very simple way of getting things down for the faux artistic angle, but there is not a great attention to detail… If it\’s working then he\’ll be trying not to laugh and if it\’s not we\’ll try something else.\’

Something of which he is undeniably in control, though, is his appearance, which he has shaped into a particular brand of shambolic-yet-stylish. Key claims it has come about gradually: ‘I think what happened is it works from the inside out; when I first did it, it was more shambolic, I had a more shambolic presence on stage, drink more, have an ill fitting suit, gradually the suit became more and more ripped, and I thought that can stay.\’ For his Slut Cracker Tour, he has cleaned up his act a bit, experimenting with being ‘more presentable and charming\’, though maintaining a slight dishevelment at all times.

Key\’s work is never allusive to other comedians, and it is difficult to pinpoint specific inspirations. Ever self-deprecating, Key jokes, ‘When I see someone who does something interesting, I think I need to think again about doing something that\’s useful.\’ In particular, it is his regular collaborators who he naturally draws upon, such as Mark Watson and Alex Horne. He pauses, before admitting that their main effect is to remind him that ‘I need to make sure I write something.\’