ZMy Morning Jacketout nowDespite universal critical acclaim and supporting slots for the likes of Idlewild and the Foo Fighters, My Morning Jacket are a band who have somehow remained firmly off the radar. Z, their fourth album, seems like a concerted effort to change that.Renowned for their distinctive brand of lush country-folk, My Morning Jacket are a 21st century update on artists such as Neil Young and Bob Dylan. Their breakthrough album, 2001’s At Dawn, was an understated masterpiece, seamlessly combining delicate acoustic guitars with subtle touches of electronica. For a band associated with dreamy, atmospheric music, the most striking feature of Z is its focus and clarity. By no means has their sound evolved beyond all recognition: Jim James’ rich, reverb-drenched vocals remain and the gentle acoustics of Knot Comes Loose and expansive psychedelia of Dondante recall the band’s earlier work. However, there has been a definite change in style in comparison to their previous albums, presumably due to a series of line-up changes during the past year. This is also the first album recorded outside of the band’s native Kentucky, and sees the band truly spreading their wings.Most noticeable is the shift towards electronica, which sees the band entering territory more normally associated with bands such as the Flaming Lips or Grandaddy. Under the influence of newly hired keyboardist Bo Koster, organs and synths dominate the album, in particular the jittery opening track Wordless Chorus, with its throbbing bass and rhythmic organ patterns.Also to the fore are the band’s pop sensibilities. Although they have always been melodic, the subtlety of My Morning Jacket’s work has meant that it has not always been accessible. On Z, tracks such as current single Off The Record and the gleeful What A Wonderful Man are the most immediate they have recorded, and will hopefully draw a wider audience into their quirkily enchanting world.Confident and progressive, Z is an impressive work for a band that are clearly still in a state of flux. A surprisingly effective change of direction for My Morning Jacket.ARCHIVE:2nd week MT 2005

Controversial, out-spoken and recently described as “a fully paid-up member of the awkward squad”, Harold Pinter was never going to accept the Nobel Prize for Literature quietly. While he made off with the hefty $1.3m prize, others began to question whether it was his plays or his political posturing which landed him the title of Nobel Laureate.On 13 October, Pinter became the first Brit to take the coveted award since VS Naipul in 2001. He had not been considered a frontrunner in the competition, with rumours tipping Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk, Syrian poet Adonis and American writer Joyce Carol Oates. Pinter, who celebrated his 75th birthday this week, is undeniably one of the foremost representativesof modern British drama. But despite his near-celebrity status his plays have not always achieved the commercial success of his contemporaries, meaning that many of his works still have to be performed in subsidised theatres.The difficulty with Pinter’s plays is that the distinctive ‘Pinteresque’ style, for which he is so famous, seems to be created by the simple trick of withholding basic information, lendinghis humdrum dialogue an aura of elusive significance. In an attempt to develop an atmosphere of enigma and vague menace, Pinter creates a sense of detachment and rigorous control, rendering his characters little more than specimens in his theatrical experiment. Of course he has had dramatic hits, most notably with his early work, The Caretaker, a gritty, kitchen-sink style comedy which has spawned a generation of copycat recreations, but his later works have failed to similarly inspire audiences.This is not the first time that the Nobel committee has honoured a controversial playwright. Just last year, Austria’s rather unpopular Elfriede Jelinek took the prize much to the consternation of many of her countrymen, who were offended by her known hostility to the ruling right-wing Freedom Party. A cynic might note a political pattern emerging and one cannot help but think that the Swedish Nobel committee, a famously peace-loving country whose people, if not their government, were extremely vocal in their anti-Iraq war protests, would be impressed by Pinter, a man who has extolled pacifist, anti-American sentiments in the British House of Commons.Indeed, his hatred of America seems to verge on the pathological and in a speech made in October 2002 he claimed “the American elephant… has grown to be a monster of grotesque and obscene proportions”.Born in Hackney on 10 October 1930, Pinter was prosecuted for being a conscientious objector in 1949 when he refused to carry out National Service, and since then he has become increasingly vocal about his vehement opposition to Western imperialism and destruction. The American right-wingers are predictably unimpressed, with one pro-Bush website making the delightful understatement, “Pinter is not our kind of guy”. Pinter’s politics are hardly unusual within the predominantly liberal, left-wing luvvie community. The majority of modern British playwrights are notable for a dogged politicisation of their plays, to the extent that dramatistslike Tom Stoppard are criticised for not being political enough. There are many who hold with Pinter’s political views and few would deny him the right to speak out against the atrocities of war, but the fact remains that whether it was intended or not, the Nobel committee made a highly politicised choice of Laureate this year. However, perhaps the extremity of Pinter’s politics would be less significant if his literary canon was able to support the magnitude of the prestigious Nobel Prize alone.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

The Oxford Impsdir Jim Grant17 OctoberThe WheatsheafHaving recently returned from a tough spell at Edinburgh, the Oxford Imps are back in the warm and predictable atmosphere of their home turf, complete with familiar pub regulars. It is Monday night and the Imps, Oxford’s only improvised comedy troupe, are onstage at their adopted home, The Wheatsheaf pub in central OxfordDuring my pre-show interview with Hannah Madsen, who is co-founder, producer and fellow comedienne of the troupe, she prepared me for what to expect from the Oxford student crowd. “The audience doesn’t always know what’s actually funny”, she said, “So that part of the reward is re-educating them as the evening progresses.” Hannah’s warning is borne out: the more the audience tries to direct the humour towards predictable TV references and innuendo, the less material the Imps are left with. In the very first sketch, the Imps are offered “voluptuous spade” and “hairy armpit” as suggestions from sniggering audience members and as I snatch a glance at Hannah, who is onstage tonight she promptly rolls her eyes at one of the other performers in exasperation. Predictably the sketch suffers from a lack of momentum, and falls flat. Hannah has also mentioned to me in advance that the Imps like to play a game in which an audience member must shout out a profession, adding, “You would be amazed at how many people say ‘gynaecologist’ as a suggestion”.Forewarned is forearmed: it took almost half an hour but sure enough, a slightly muffled voice from the back of the room shouts it out, to be greeted with a trickle of laughter. Re-educating the audience may sound “a bit patronising”, as Hannah readily admits, but then the Imps’ own brand of humour is a little at odds with mainstream pub comedy, bringing an oddball, pantomimicedge to their improvised performances. Though she enjoys watching performers at London’s Comedy Store, led by such famous frontmen as Paul Merton, she feels their humour has evolved from the lager-lad ethos of “taking the piss”, which relies on a cynical upstaging of fellow comedians for effect.Though not without merit, it is a less spontaneous, less varied show than the Imps hope to achieve. With a distinctly trans-Atlantic cast, their style veers away from the traditionalBritish comedy model, their humour based instead on emotions and characters which subsume the occasional big comic moment for riotous applause at the end of each sketch. Their auditions are almost counter-intuitive, since they claim to turn away people who, despite being genuinely funny, prove incapable of supporting the rest of the cast. “You don’t need to be funny to start as an Imp”, Hannah insists, but you do need confidence and decisiveness. Their enthusiasm and spontaneity belies a strenuous work ethic, according to which every newcomer must undergo a term’s rehearsals before he is even allowed on the stage, and a strict ban on repeating gags prevents incipient staleness. If this all sounds too much like an Ivy League sports pep-talk, it is nevertheless a formula that has worked brilliantly so far.The Imps have performed 180 live shows and are so much a part of the fabric of Oxford culture that it is easy to forget their short lifespan. Even when they began in 2004, they appeared very much as the finished article, and two years on they have changed their members less regularlythan the staff of The Wheatsheaf. Having just spent a month in Edinburgh selling their show to a “more cultured” audience that expects more and forgives less than the students who will “laugh at anything”, this term might be the one time to catch them at their very best.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

The Maidsdir Yashar Alishenas25 – 29 OctoberBurton TaylorSex sells but playwright Jean Genet believes that lesbian sex sells even better. Loosely based on the 1933 real-life story of the Papin sisters who murdered their female employers, The Maids is otherwise entirely fictionalised and Genet formulates a tale of a dominating mistress and two French maids, who are not only sisters, but also lesbians.Theatrical criticism has bracketed the notorious Genet within the absurdist school of theatre, yet such a vague categorisation falls short of encapsulating the biting intensity of this unique playwright, novelist, thief and rentboy. The Maids is among his best-known theatrical works in which the sisters, Claire (Helen Winston) and Solange (Serena Martin) work as housemaids to their impossibly ‘beautiful and good, mistress (Jamie Gaw). However, these adult sisters remain stuck in their childhood and, devoid of any male contact in the cell-like confines of their domestic workplace, games of Doctors and Nurses have become replaced by pseudo-erotic renditions of Mistress and Maid.The play opens into just such a scene of sisterly role-play, with Claire dressing up in her mistress’ clothes while Solange acts the part of downtrodden maid. The scene is initially bewildering to the audience, but director Yashar Alishenas soon clarifies the women’s situation, cautiously revealingtheir precarious relationship which hovers uncomfortably between sisterly affection and fantasised eroticism. The vicious playfulness between Claire and Solange is recognisably that of siblings, yet the power of these play-acting scenes is never quite recreated in those that jump back to reality,and the ‘real’ passionate outbursts seem flat in comparison. This is a challenging piece for any actress, but for young students performing in 21st century Oxford, the task is that much more overwhelming. Yet Winston apparently tackles her role with ease, turning in a performanceof wild femininity and brutal sensuality, utterly compelling from the outset. Martin reacts well as the submissive relation, creating a foil for Winston’s haughty authority, while Gaw truly lives up to the hype of the beautiful lady of the house. Winston and Martin have an obvious rapport,and while scenes with all three characters can lack the depth of these dualogues, Winston’s commanding presence onstage regularly buoys any lacklustre moments.The actresses are choreographed well within the thrust-staging space and there are some other nice directional touches, such as the repeated motif of Claire turning away from the audience, only to have her image reflected back at them by a dressing table mirror. Yet despite such inventive attention to detail, there is an underlying feeling that the audience has somehow been duped. Perhaps this was all part of Genet’s idea, where the boundaries between ‘play’ and reality are blurred to the point of utter mystification, but he cheats his audienceby throwing up innumerable questions without ever pointing to where the answers can be found. The real-life mystery of why the Papin sisters killed their employers was never solved and likewise, the motivation behind Claire and Solange’s desire to murder their mistress is never fully explored. Therefore, their anger seems disappointingly hollow and unfounded.Undeniably, this play would have had a greater resonance with a contemporaryaudience, but quite apart from these contextual difficulties, the complex storyline never quite shrugs off its associations with male fantasy, centring on a pair of scissors-sisters locked in a world of domestic ritual and compliance. The Maids was cutting-edge drama in its time but it now stands as a glorious period piece and Alishenas has admirably resurrected this intriguing play with a tight and uplifting production.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

The Yalta Gamedir Laura Noiret, Philip Harker-Smith25 to 29 OctoberBurton TaylorThe Yalta Game is a fascinating insight into power, status, security and loneliness, explored within the framework of a highly elusive and ambiguous love episode. The play documents the relationship between Dmitry Gurov (Conal McLean) and Anna Sergeyvna (CecilyHoward), initiated in a Russian coffee shop, and continued erratically over what we assume is a number of years. Using descriptive and evocative language, Friel poses deeply engaging questions regarding the indefinable nature of love: is this characterised by obsession, lust, worship, or an intangibility represented by none of these?Co-directors Laura Noiret and Philip Harker-Smith have made effective use of a simple set and staging. The lack of definition between both scenes and setting lends itself well to a drama in which the audience is constantly transported from one location to another, slipping from cafe to waterfall, from quayside to bedroom. However, given the minimal staging and set requirements, a more extensive use of props could have served to emphasise the constant shifting between the elusiveness of the relationship, and the corresponding tangibility of reality. The music of a solo cello infuses the drama with an atmosphere of haunting and intense loneliness, and serves to enhance the juxtaposition between beauty and loneliness so characteristic of Anna and Dmitry’s relationship.Dmitry’s desperation and loneliness is portrayed excellently by McLean, who commands sympathy with the intensity of his yearning, borne out in his intense facial expressionsand focus. Cecily Howard gives a convincing performance of a woman in search of both adventure and security, portraying the naive and flirtatious side of her character well through gesture and voice. However, in a play that relies so heavily on the expression of an intangible emotional connection, a greater sense of ease and tenderness between the actors would have helped enhance the two performances. Excellent though these were, the characters remained isolated from one another.This production of The Yalta Game promises to be an evocative piece of theatre, where Friel’s beautiful portrayal of a complex relationship is explored with certainty and sensitivity.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

Travestiesdir Lotte Wakeham27 to 29 OctoberO’ReillyLosing one revolution may be regarded as a misfortune, but to lose two seems like carelessness”.Such epigrams may never have been delivered by Lenin, but in the mismatched memories of British consulate Henry Carr, wartime politics take a determined turn for the Wilde, as the boundaries between art and life, perception and reality fall away in hilarious Stoppardian fashion.Travesties plunges us into Carr’s patchy recollections of Zurich, 1917, where the paths of Lenin, James Joyce and Dadaist artist Tristan Tzara briefly converge within the framework of a production of The Importance of Being Earnest. Wakeham’s production is set among the half-remembered, half-filled bookcases of Zurich Public Library, where faces peering through gaps in the shifting shelves suggest the political espionage of wartime Europe and the hazy acquaintances drifting through Carr’s memory. It is quickfire wordplay that Stoppard does best, and the cast here manage admirably with the demands of the play’s complex verbal jousting.Jack Hawkins, as the dandyish Carr, is a commanding presence, his urbane Englishness juxtaposed perfectly with the avantgarde excesses of his revolutionary peers. Particularly impressive are the exchanges between Hawkins and Stewart Pringle’s Tzara, where witty dialogues on the function of art move seamlessly into powerful meditations on the morality of war. It is in such juxtapositions that this production excels: the cast revel in the dualities of their characters, drifting between the real and the fantastical, the remembered and the imagined. Max Pritchard is hilarious as an impish James Joyce, and Charlotte Cox is similarly impressive in her delightful portrayal of Cecily. Her coquettish exchanges with Hawkins and subsequentstriptease provide some of the more comically surreal moments in which the play really finds its energy.The cast do an excellent job in sustaining an air of spontaneity in Stoppard’s selfconsciously ‘intelligent nonsense’, knowingly navigating the complexities of modernism, Dadaismand Wildean wit with all the necessary vibrancy. ‘The truth’, in true Wilde style, ‘is rarely pure, and never simple’, and Stoppard bends the ‘truth’ to his own fascinating and hilarious ends.ARCHIVE: 2nd week MT 2005

A series of controversies has been brought to light during a second inquest into the death of lightweight rower Leo Blockley in December 2000. Senior members of Blockley’s rowing club OULRC were found to have conspired to withhold information from the University’s investigation into the tragedy. Blockley, who was studying for a Masters in Applied Statistics at Lincoln College, went missing after his team’s boat was swamped by waves on the river Ebro while on a training camp near Barcelona on 29 December 2000 just days before his 22nd birthday. His body was found almost a month later several miles downstream. The tragedy was blamed on “freak weather” resulting in 50mph winds which caused the boat to capsize when the crew attempted to cross the river. The first inquest into Blockley’s death in 2001 had recorded a verdict of “accidental death” but when Blockley’s parents uncovered new information relating to safety they contacted the coroner, John Pollard. In an unusual move, Pollard obtained a High Court order enabling him to quash his original verdict on 2 March this year. Speaking to Cherwell, Blockley’s parents said, “We felt Leo’s death had been avoidable. We decided we would campaign to make sure this totally unnecessary and easily remedied problem was sorted.”After Mr and Mrs Blockley met with members of the crew and one of the coaches it emerged that senior members of the OULRC made an agreement not to disclose information relating to the head coach, Leila Hudson. It transpired that she had been drinking only a few hours before embarking on the river.Reverend Jeremy Fagan, then President of the OULRC, told the inquest that the head coach’s “abilities were certainly impaired” as she was “still under the influence of alcohol.” In his narrative verdict at the Stockport Coroner’s Court, Pollard criticised the boat club, saying it was “a matter of great regret that they regarded the reputation of the rowing club as of greater importance than the death of a young man.” He said that “There was what might have been called a conspiracy or also more accurately an agreement by a number of senior officers of the OULRC that they would not make known that the head coach had been suffering the effects of alcohol at the time of death.” He said that University investigator Richard Hartley had been “kept in the dark” and unable to carry out a full investigation. However, Pollard conceded that the fact that Hudson had been drinking the night before had probably not influenced the outcome of the incident.The inquest heard further that there had been no OULRC safety officer in place at the time of Leo’s death. There was confusion between the President of the crew and the Head Coach as to who was responsible for safety and as a result basic safety procedure had been disregarded. The Amateur Rowing Association said in a statement that the inquest revealed “a worrying disregard for the ARA’s guidance on water safety within the OULRC” and that they were disappointed that Fagan “failed to raise his concerns about drunkeness” when he first reported the incident to the association.Fagan responded to the statement, saying “I find it interesting that the ARA seeks to put blame onto me in a way that the coroner specifically didn’t do… I was the first person to tell the Blockleys and their solicitor about what I had seen of Leila [Hudson] that morning, and I have apologised to them, to the coroner, and to the then University Marshal Richard Hartley, for not telling them sooner.”Dr Jonathan Price from Queen’s College, who was the Junior Coach at the time of Leo’s death, also testified at the second inquest. He agreed that Pollard’s verdict was “fair, reasonable and comprehensive,” and described it as “a great relief to have given evidence publicly on this matter, after almost five years.”Jon Roycroft, appointed Oxford University Director of Sport since Blockley’s death, pointed out that “things have changed massively in the last five years” in terms of rowing safety. The coaches on the 2000 trip had been volunteers without clear employment regulations: the University now uses professional, paid coaches. Roycroft stressed that “rowing is now one of the most developed [sports] in terms of safety,” emphasising that since 2003 all members of university and college crews have had to take part in a swim test in accordance with the ARA Water Safety Code. A spokesperson for Oxford University said that they hoped the narrative verdict would “bring an end to any outstanding doubts or concerns of the family or others involved in the tragedy that the causes may not have been fully explored or understood.” They said that the University “takes the safety and welfare of all those involved in sporting activities extremely seriously.”Fagan said “Leo was very hardworking, good fun to be around and he always gave 100%.” Asked about the inquest he said that he was “glad everything is out in the open.” He added that he hoped safety measures would change soon and emphasised the importance of boat buoyancy and targeted safety training for crew members. Mr and Mrs Blockley have since founded the Leo Blockley memorial campaign which presses for improved boat buoyancy. They told Cherwell: “We have no bad feelings towards the crew who lived through the terror of the accident…They looked to senior people to guide them, but that guidance was wrong.” They added that they would “always be indebted” to the brave members of the crew who were “put under pressure to keep it all quiet.” They described Leo as “someone you would always remember even if you only met him once.” “He was generous and genuinely caring and he lived life to the full. We consider it a privilege to have had him as a son.”ARCHIVE: 1st week MT 2005

Two first-year Lincoln students are facing serious disciplinary measures following a drunken incident on Saturday night in which a bench was dropped from a roof at Somerville College. The pair gained entry to Somerville late in the evening during the college’s bop. They found a bench which they proceeded to carry up a flight of stairs to the roof. Whilst carrying it they dropped it and the bench fell, smashing on the car park of the Oratory Catholic Church below.Lincoln College Dean Peter McCulloch confirmed that “an incident of that description is being investigated and handled internally.” An anonymous Lincoln source said that the students had dropped the bench accidentally and had not deliberately thrown it off the roof. The students then came forward the next day to admit to their actions and apologised to representatives of Somerville College.The students are facing a disciplinary committee at their college, which will decide on suitable punishment. McCulloch said that Lincoln are “taking the allegations very seriously.” The disciplinary committee is still hearing the case and is yet to decide on punishment.A number of Lincoln students speculated that the two involved would be likely to have to pay for the cost of the bench and punitive charges. McCulloch said that “monetary fines are part of a large range of disciplinary options within the college rules.”Mark Schaan, Assistant Dean at Somerville said he believed that the bench was worth around £500, although he did not think that it was one of a number of memorial benches owned by Somerville, which hold particular sentimental significance. He did not wish to comment on the ongoing investigations into the incident.None of Cherwell’s sources believe that anyone was hurt in the incident or that any damage was done other than to the bench itself. Members of the clergy at the Oratory Church did not wish to comment on the incident.ARCHIVE: 1st week MT 2005