We meet a marsupial neighbour

We found this presumed lassie (see below) enjoying a dozy breakfast on our neighbour's front yard quince tree.
Later research has identified her as an Agile Antechinus native to the south eastern Victorian coastal area and not to be confused with almost identical brown antichinus that lives in the southern NSW coast, and various other varieties described by the Museum Victoria
While she was not terribly agile when we saw her, we are reliably informed by Wikipedia  that  she prefers to eat beetles spiders and cockroaches, choosing  fruit only when these are scarce. Perhaps her first name has been given because the agile antechinus has a short and violent breeding season, after which the males all die, and the female gives birth after 27 days.

Two French Films and a theatrical Frankenstein

We don't go to many movies, but went twice to the recent French Film Festival.

Un Château en Italie, centres on a debt ridden palazzo in Piedmonte. Lovely setting there, but the scenes also move to Paris and London. The script was written and the film directed and starred Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, and included her former lover playing her lover and her mother playing her character's dotty mother as main characters in the cast. The film also made biographical reference to her brother who died of AIDS. (She left out her sister, wife of President Sarkozy.) An intense family saga nominated for Palme d'Or 2013 but got some testy reviews. I liked it but my wife didn't.

Belle et Sėbastian is set breathtakingly in the Rhône Alpes. We expected this to be a feel good story about a boy and his dog. It is in fact one of the genre of helping Jewish refugees escape Nazis in 1943. Thin story line but a really nice dog- Maremma I think.

 

The Rabble Theatre Company is the Malthouse's company in residence this year. They are currently presenting a re-think of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as a female doctor who uses IVF- like techniques to create a monster in the form of an adult female with many many breasts. She is rejected. Loud screams, blinding lights and totally in your face.

Our email from Malthouse warned that "Frankenstein contains nudity, graphic imagery particularly related to pregnancy, sexual content, violence, adult themes, horror themes, coarse language, loud noises, strobe effects and smoke effects." Yes, all of that, but this is a serious and demanding piece of theatre raising questions about life and motherhood. I found it a memorable endurance trial, my wife thought it very worthwhile.

Photo : The Age

 

 

Posted with Blogsy

Birregurra and Brae

 
 Image sent to us by Brae

We have been saving up to visit Brae since reservations first opened last November. It is possibly the most expensive rural restaurant in Australia, but we enjoyed several visits to Dunkeld's Royal Mail hotel when chef Dan Hunter was leading the kitchen team there. Brae under his creative command is even better. There have been rave reviews in the foodie press.
We experienced delightful surprises in ingredients, contrasting but pleasing flavours on the plate, and wonderful complementarity of wines. Big surprises - sake to drink with duck offal, a sauce for eel and sea urchin made by soaking and pressing macadamia nuts.
The hours we spent there on Thursday evening with multiple courses and matched wines is described and itemised in pictures at our photo website: yanton.smugmug.com
We were glad when discussing matched wine that our hosts offered us the option of a half serve of each glass at half tariff- that ensured that we were fit to drive back to our B&B at evening's close and was in any event an elegant sufficiency.

We like Birregurra.  It has a main street with echos of the early 20th century and '60s makeovers including a horrible fibro type reconstruction of a once handsome facade of the 1895 Mechanics' Institute.

Its one track train station has been re-opened for service after being  discontinued in the1963.

Our B&B "Harvest at Birregurra" was outstanding. A large comfortable tastefully furnished room and a beautiful cooked breakfast. Again a suite of photos is on our yanton.smugmug website linked above for those interested in more image particulars.

The B&B , the village, and the restaurant are very highly recommended for a special occasion- perhaps combine with a trip to Lorne or the Otways?

Malthouse's Government Inspector

We took out our third subscription to Malthouse, for 2014, last September

The first was to be "Philadelphia Story" a 1930s work by Philip Barry, and our first surprise was to be informed that the production had been denied copyright for performance by the estate of the playwright's wife. The substitute announced was Nicolai Gogol's "The Government Inspector" which we of course recognized as a classic of Russian farce and quite looked forward to being educated in this eastern genre in light of current world events. We should have been tipped off about expectations when we received an email on the eve of the performance saying "In an extreme case of art meets life, this production – created after a series of fateful mishaps – is about a show created after a series of fateful mishaps. Turn that around in your head a few times. 'It’s completely silly and one of the silliest things I’ve ever done.' Director Simon Stone "

 

 Photo from arts hub linked below

We had a great night and thought it a marvellous season launch for a theatre known for its exuberant productions.

In the result I heartily endorse this review by Deborah Stone at arts hub

"The original Government Inspector is a play about mistaken identity and the way we beg to be made fools of. The inhabitants of a corrupt Soviet town hear that an incognito inspector will be visiting and go to extraordinary lengths to please the new arrival; except that the new arrival is not the real inspector, merely a humble civil servant who ends up making fools of them all. Stone gives us an entirely different setting, a contemporary ensemble of actors waiting for a star director from Russia. But the setting is only part of the way in which this production plays with the original. It is much more a theatrical riff on the themes of The Government Inspector than a modernised or even a reset production, so that the title turns out to be as much mistaken identity as everything else.
The pleasure of this production is much like that of a jazz performance: the play takes off in multiple directions that escape the discipline of form but reward us with the joy of performance itself, an occasionally discernible melody and some individual moments of virtuosity. The result is enormous fun, if a little chaotic."