{"id":26684,"date":"2017-11-10T03:48:40","date_gmt":"2017-11-10T11:48:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=26684"},"modified":"2017-11-09T10:10:59","modified_gmt":"2017-11-09T18:10:59","slug":"orwells-vision-timeless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2017\/11\/10\/orwells-vision-timeless\/","title":{"rendered":"Orwell\u2019s vision timeless"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bernard Cuffling as George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner\u2019s adaptation of George Orwell\u2019s Coming Up for Air,<\/em> at Kay Meek Studio Theatre Nov. 16-25. (photo by Stephen Courtenay)<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Award-winning actor Bernard Cuffling portrays George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner\u2019s award-winning adaptation of George Orwell\u2019s Coming Up for Air<\/em>. Presented by Kay Meek Studio Theatre and One-O-One Productions, the one-man stage play opens Nov. 16.<\/p>\n

First published in 1939, Orwell\u2019s novel centres on 45-year-old insurance salesman George Bowling, \u201cwho makes an escape from \u2018Hilda and the kids\u2019 in London for a few days following a win at the races,\u201d explains the promotional material. \u201cGeorge visits his boyhood village in an attempt to recapture childhood innocence, but finds it changed beyond recognition by the effects of modern life. His feelings of loss are intensified by the threat of war looming on the horizon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cProse is the most intimate of writing \u2013 nothing separates the writer from the reader. Plus, there are no physical limitations to the setting, time, etc.,\u201d Mildiner, a member of the Jewish community, told the Independent<\/em> about the challenges of taking a novel and turning it into play. \u201cTheatre is both a physical medium and collaboration. Physically, the storytelling is constrained by the limits of the performance space, restrictions of real time and the physical limitations of the actor\/s in that space. So, the challenge is to take the unbridled narrative possibilities of prose and contain them on stage. Specifically, a stage play can only cover so much of the story unraveling over the length of a novel, so large sections of the narrative have to be edited or tossed aside. But, thankfully, whatever the medium, all stories have a beginning, middle, end \u2013 or three acts. What\u2019s lost [are] certain subtleties and nuances of the story. What\u2019s gained: the director (me!), actor and designers get to bring the story to life whatever way we choose.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"photo<\/a>
Leslie Mildiner (Courtesy of Kay Meek Studio Theatre)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As a teenager, living in Britain, Mildiner published his first novel; he published his second novel when he was 22. In those years, according to his bio, he \u201cwas immersed in the British fringe theatre\/alternative comedy scene as a writer and performer. On arriving in Vancouver in the early \u201980s, he was drawn to the scene here when he was engaged as a comedy performer at Expo 86.\u201d His scripts have been produced by Vancouver companies like Arts Club, Touchstone and the Firehall Arts Centre, and across Canada. He has also written for TV animation shows, including Kid vs. Kat<\/em> and Class of the Titans<\/em>.<\/p>\n

So, what interested him in adapting a novel and, in particular, Coming Up for Air<\/em>?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe main character George Bowling\u2019s struggle to do \u2018the right thing,\u2019\u201d said Mildiner. \u201cHe\u2019s a bit of an ass \u2013 and you probably wouldn\u2019t want to meet him in real life \u2013 but he has a solid moral core and struggles against his need to be \u2018the messenger,\u2019 the canary in the coal mine. I found this fascinating. Also, it makes him a modern-type anti-hero. Also, because he is flawed, the audience get to see themselves reflected in him when he is forced to make choices.\u201d<\/p>\n

The anxieties and tensions described in Coming Up for Air<\/em> are still relevant, almost 80 years after its publication.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing Up for Air<\/em> was published in 1939, a couple of years after Orwell\u2019s experiences in the Spanish Civil War, where he witnessed the hope of people\u2019s revolution turn into totalitarianism, with the threat of Hitler and Germany looming,\u201d explained Mildiner. \u201cIn 2017, post-9\/11, we live in an increasing paranoid world where even in the West, individual rights (seem) to be eroding. Plus, we have an unstable, narcissistic leader of the Free World, daily making attacks against minorities and those with no power, blaming \u2018the Other\u2019 for everything that\u2019s wrong. Also, with the [President Donald] Trump insistence that everything in opposition is \u2018fake news,\u2019 including his own lies, Orwell\u2019s \u2018Newspeak\u2019 has been brought to life.\u201d<\/p>\n

That said, added Mildiner, \u201cDespite Trump, international terrorism, racism, corporate mentality and consumerism, I don\u2019t think Orwell predicted the rise of modern humanism \u2013 our real desires and efforts to look after each other. For example, the conservation movement, eco-awareness, fight for indigenous rights, children\u2019s rights, [the] LGBT movement.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Orwell did foresee many aspects of the future accurately.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn seemingly incidental ways,\u201d said Mildiner, \u201cComing Up for Air<\/em> is prophetic: the main character encounters urbanization (his small village is now a large suburb), box stores \u2013 he complains about new chain stores and the advent of fast food joints. \u2018Everything is streamlined and sleek \u2013 comfort doesn\u2019t matter,\u2019 he complains at one point. People from that era would be appalled at the idea of an eatery posting signs telling you [that] you can only stay for a set period of time!\u201d<\/p>\n

Coming Up for Air<\/em> runs at Kay Meek Studio Theatre in West Vancouver Nov. 16-25. Tickets ($29-$45) can be purchased at kaymeek.com\/coming-up-for-air<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bernard Cuffling as George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner\u2019s adaptation of George Orwell\u2019s Coming Up for Air, at Kay Meek Studio Theatre Nov. 16-25. (photo by Stephen Courtenay) Award-winning actor Bernard Cuffling portrays George Bowling in Leslie Mildiner\u2019s award-winning adaptation of George Orwell\u2019s Coming Up for Air. Presented by Kay Meek Studio Theatre and One-O-One Productions, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":26685,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[785],"tags":[7566,7568,7567,6208],"class_list":["post-26684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-performing-arts","tag-george-orwell","tag-kay-meek-studio-theatre","tag-leslie-mildiner","tag-theatre"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}