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The Guardian
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘I got a nosebleed in minutes!' How the Wedding Present's indie banger classics inspired a musical
In 2009, Matt Aston was watching the Wedding Present frontman David Gedge perform a 'bizarre and brilliant' gig with the BBC Big Band when he was struck by a notion: that the combination of the singer's conversational lyrics and brassy, orchestrated new arrangements felt a bit like, well, watching a musical. 'I parked the idea,' says Aston, a theatre director and writer. 'Then some time later, I saw David's other band Cinerama with a 16-piece orchestra and thought, 'This could be musical theatre!'' Aston had had a few drinks and remembers sitting afterwards, trying to convince his mate – screenwriter and playwright William Ivory, who hadn't been drinking – that this wasn't the daftest idea ever. 'Billy said, 'You can't make a musical out of Wedding Present lyrics. It's not that kind of music.'' Aston laughs, aware that pop musicals tend to be vehicles for colourful, uber-mainstream acts such as Queen or Abba, not veteran indie rock bands. 'But I said, 'Oh yes you can.'' And oh yes he has. Reception: A New Musical is about to premiere in the band's home town of Leeds. Various Covid-related delays mean its appearance now serendipitously coincides with the band's 40th anniversary and new retrospective collection, 40. Aston, more usually associated with theatrical productions such as Ivory's RAF play Bomber's Moon, insists he would never have done it without Gedge, the show's creative consultant. However, the singer says that when Aston first approached him in 2020, he was 'astounded'. Gedge, speaking by video call from his Brighton home, says: 'I told him, 'I don't know anything about musicals – and I'm not even sure I like them!' But he explained that my lyrics are like dialogue, which he could link together in a storyline. Then the pandemic happened and I was half expecting to never hear from him again. A year ago, he called and said, 'I've written it. I'm starting auditioning and then rehearsals. Can you come along?'' Reception isn't a biographical musical. It's an emotionally charged story about friends who meet at the University of Leeds and subsequently go through ups, downs and breakups. When I sit in on rehearsals, I instantly pick up on Gedge's impassioned lyrics. Lines such as 'I just decided I don't trust you any more', from the 1990 hit Brassneck, are delivered by characters in emotionally appropriate situations, experiencing love, betrayal, loss, you name it. Meanwhile, actor-musicians nail that head-rushing Wedding Present sound, something the singer sums up as 'the Velvet Underground – but faster'. The Wedding Present have been York-based Aston's favourite band ever since he saw them at Confettis nightclub in Derby on 20 October 1988. They were one of the foremost British indie rock bands of the late 80s and 90s, successors to the Smiths. 'I was 15 and really small,' he grins during a lunchbreak. 'Everyone had to huddle around me to sneak me in. But the noise, the lights, the surge forward, beer going everywhere, balloons coming down from the ceiling … I got a nosebleed within minutes, but I was blown away.' Since that day, he has seen the Wedding Present and Cinerama '60 or 70' times. Like the characters in Reception, the band came together in and around Leeds uni. Born in the town's Bramley area, maths student Gedge was the first of his extended working-class family to go into higher education. 'So,' he says, 'when I packed it in and said, 'I'm gonna be famous', they were appalled. I stopped going home because we'd have arguments all the time. But they had instilled a work ethic. I was very driven.' Gedge describes how the band sat individually cutting and glueing the sleeves for 500 copies of their first single, Go Out and Get 'Em Boy!, released on their Reception label for £500. When John Peel played it on Radio 1, the singer was so excited he ran all the way to bassist Keith Gregory's house to shout: 'Have you got the radio on?' As Gedge recalls: 'Peel played it 10 times. At that point, my life changed.' Although 1987 debut album George Best and 1989's Bizarro exemplify the band's inimitable, classic sound, Gedge insists the musical fits in with 'the Wedding Present tradition of going off at weird tangents'. Indeed. George Best was an indie No 1, making them such hot property that they signed to major label RCA for 'the sort of deal normally given to people like Annie Lennox'. And then their next release for their new label was an album of Ukrainian folk songs, instigated by guitarist Peter Solowka (who later formed the Ukrainians). In 1991, as the music world went baggy, the 'Weddoes' listened to US alt-rock and made the slower, darker album Seamonsters with 'a maverick engineer no one had heard of'. This was Steve Albini, who subsequently produced Nirvana. 'We literally lost half our fans,' Gedge admits. 'But now they all think it's one of our best albums.' In 1992, they released a single every month. 'That was such a great idea that we had it all planned within 15 minutes,' the singer laughs. 'All seven-inch singles, cover versions on the B-side, matching sleeves. To RCA's credit, they said OK.' All of which paid off when the band equalled Elvis Presley's record of 12 UK Top 40 hits in one year. There have also been some lyrical curveballs: 1987's All About Eve reflected on the year Gedge spent in apartheid South Africa as a child, while 1989's Kennedy dwelt on conspiracy theories. But Gedge insists that the overwhelming majority of his 300-plus songs are about relationships, meaning they're well-suited for drama. His early lyrics are particularly raw. The 2018 documentary Something Left Behind suggested they were all triggered by being dumped by his first love, but Gedge says otherwise. 'Jaz was my first proper girlfriend. She chucked me and went off with someone else, but after her there was Alexandra, then Sally.' He says a lot of the lyrics – such as those to My Favourite Dress ('a drunken kiss, a stranger's hand on my favourite dress') – were drawn from real life. 'But that wasn't Jaz, that was Alexandra.' For Aston, such songs capture 'those moments we all have where someone is the centre of your world, then your world ends and that kind of defines you'. To this day, Wedding Present gigs are full of men (and some women) of a certain age, singing Gedge's words, occasionally tearfully. 'A psychologist once explained that men of my generation didn't talk about emotions,' says the singer, 'so they come up and thank me for getting them through their divorce or whatever with the songs. It's flattering – but I just write songs. I'm not a doctor who saved their life.' One fan is Keir Starmer. In 2023, the PM – who studied law in Leeds – revealed that My Favourite Dress, which is beautifully reimagined in Reception as a piano ballad, is one of his favourite songs. 'David,' Starmer explained, 'managed to perfectly distil the tortuous agonising feelings of jealousy into three minutes of angst.' 'He came to a lot of our early gigs,' Gedge reveals. 'I don't remember him because there were loads of lads and girls, but he was a mate of a mate of Keith's and I'm told I have hung out with him.' The singer smiles broadly. 'But I'm still waiting for my invitation to Downing Street, like Noel Gallagher got from Tony Blair.' Now 65, Gedge carries his 'indie rock god' status lightly. When Aston first met him properly, after years of 'mumbled hellos at the merchandise stall', he found someone he could work with – and whose presence looms over Reception. 'There are many not-so-subtle references in the script,' the writer-director laughs. 'All the character names are from the songs. The lead character spends a year in Seattle, which David did, although we moved the couple in My Favourite Dress from Manchester to Brighton. So there's a bit of me in there and a lot of him.' For Gedge, Reception is 'a fictional story but it kind of features me without me. Which is clever, really.' Aston knows the project is quite a departure but says: 'I wouldn't take the risk for myself or David if I thought it wouldn't work. It's a love letter to the band – a thank you for the last 40 years.' Reception: A New Musical is at The Warehouse in Holbeck (Slung Low), Leeds, from 22 August to 6 September. The 4CD/4LP 40-song collection 40 is released on 19 September. The Wedding Present tour from 23 September
Yahoo
04-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Marvel's sleek 1960s makeover looks Fantastic. But is it enough?
This summer's Fantastic 4 film will be the 37th instalment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise, and there is nothing its trailer would like you to think about less than that. 'First Steps,' insists the subtitle – never mind that seven previous incarnations of Marvel's so-called First Family have made it to the screen already; three times in cinemas (sort of; we'll get to that) and four on television. 'You don't recognise me!' beams the new Marvel Studios emblem – rejigged to resemble the Cinerama logo which since the 1950s has been synonymous with good old-fashioned spectacle for the masses. The online release of the trailer itself was artificially 'delayed' – no content conveyor belt here, folks – with an hour-long countdown in the style of a rocket launch followed by 10 minutes of live conversation with the four leads, Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bachrach. Even its opening shot of the Baxter Building foyer resembles curtains opening on an empty stage. Ant-Man and the Wasp? We don't know them. New Captain America? We didn't even meet the old one. After nearly two decades of world-building, and approaching six years of franchise decline, the big Marvel thumb finally appears to have come down on the red button marked 'Fresh Start. In theory, the Fantastic Four should be ideally suited to this purpose. They were the first classic Marvel characters to be dreamt up by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the creative duo who would go on to invent the Hulk, Thor, the X-Men, Black Panther, and almost every other Avenger on whose brawny backs brand Marvel was built. From their 1961 debut, as chirpy avatars of US nuclear-age derring-do, they were the blue-eyed embodiment of American pop culture's clean slate. Yet for all of the trailer's pristine sheen, the spectres of prior live-action Fantastic Fours still loom large in the minds of those unlucky enough to have sat through any or all of them. There was the unreleased Roger Corman take from the early 1990s, made by a German producer, Bernd Eichinger, for $1 million, primarily so he could cling onto the rights, which he'd picked up in the 1980s on the cheap. The film – a corny, Flash Gordon-esque romp – was shot with a cast of unknowns in the winter of 1992 and 1993, and scheduled for release in early 1994. But shortly before its January premiere – at a Minneapolis shopping centre, of all places – the negatives were seized and destroyed in a deal struck by Avi Arad, the veteran Marvel executive who would later found and chair Marvel Studios itself. Why? Because at that moment, a rogue, low-budget Marvel production was seen to jeopardise the value of the Fantastic Four brand – which was ironic, given what came next. With the quartet rescued from B-movie ignominy, development began on a blockbuster version, which was originally to be directed and co-written by Chris Columbus, of the first two Home Alone and Harry Potter films. But development stretched on like Reed Richards' limbs, and after a few further iterations (including a 1960s period piece sketched out by future Ant-Man director Peyton Reed), Barbershop and Taxi's Tim Story took the wheel, and a very noughties-pin-up cast (Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, a pre-Captain America Chris Evans) was assembled. Fantastic Four: The First One, Honest was released in 2005: around eight months after the very concept of a superhero family had been wittily and movingly deconstructed in The Incredibles, the enormous global Pixar hit. In that unfortunate context, FF '05 felt almost aggressively shallow: sci-fi action via mid market lad magazine. (Indeed, Alba was 9th on FHM's Hundred Sexiest Women chart the following year, and topped it the year after that.) But Story's original take was popular enough for Fox to task him with rushing out a (worse still) sequel, Rise of the Silver Surfer, within the next two years. Reviews weren't notably worse, but Fox executives noted the profit margin had narrowed: a slightly larger budget plus slightly lower takings meant this was a franchise that had to be rethought. Warner Bros had Christopher Nolan's Batman; Marvel Studios were readying Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk. How could the Fantastic Four be reworked to meet the demands of a newly sincere and ambitious superhero marketplace? The answer was: catastrophically. Work on a reboot began in 2009 and plopped and bubbled away for five years. Its director, Josh Trank, was a promising up-and-comer who had made his name with the found-footage superhero indie Chronicle, while the cast, Miles Teller, Michael B Jordan, Kate Mara and Jamie Bell, had the acting chops and diverse heritage the form now required. What they didn't have, it transpired, was a healthy working environment or a functional final script: Mara later made allusions to the 'horrible' climate on set, while Trank's original bleak, downbeat take – odd for a famously colourful, upbeat property – was heavily reshot and recut, with a climatic sequence that was partly written on set the day it was filmed. (Trank disowned the film on social media the day before its release.) The result barely scraped back its $120 million production budget worldwide – this, at a time when even Ant-Man was making half a billion – and again, Marvel's former A-team found themselves benched. In light of all that, as well as a general wearying of the broader Marvel project, it's no wonder that the new trailer goes out of its way to promise novelty, while notably lacking even the slightest gesture towards any of the preceding Marvel films. Despite the 1960s retro-futurist stylings, from the swoopingly sleek design of the Fantasti-Car design to the appearance from robotic sidekick H.E.R.B.I.E., it feels tonally closest to the Story films, albeit with a twist of 2020s earnestness. ('Whatever life throws at us, face it together,' muses Kirby's Sue Storm, while Quinn's Johnny Storm's flight into the atmosphere, during which his Human Torch flames are extinguished, smacks a little of Sistine Chapel ceiling – mortal man within prodding range of God.) Its dramatic credentials are slyly burnished with all those shots of Moss-Bachrach's Ben Grimm in the kitchen – a reference to the actor's breakout role on the acclaimed series The Bear. And if the rock-skin visual effects look a little bit fake, then perhaps that's indicative of a wider dawning problem within the superhero genre: as both artistry and technology in this field improve, the fundamental unreality of the ideas they're realising only becomes more conspicuous. (The villain Galactus is played by none other than Ralph Ineson, aka Finchy from The Office, and kept largely hidden from us in the trailer.) Still, along with James Gunn's Superman – also due in cinemas this July – Fantastic 4: First Steps has more on its itinerary than the usual leap-tall-buildings, outrun-speeding-bullets checklist. Both films are out to haul their respective comic-book worlds out of their ruts, by restoring optimism and wonder to a now drab and cynical genre. To find a path to the future, both Marvel and DC are going back to their roots.
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Rotterdam Fest Director Expresses Solidarity For ‘The Seed Of The Sacred Fig' Actress Soheila Golestani Following Iran Travel Ban
Rotterdam Film Festival director Vanja Kaludjercic has spoken out against the travel ban preventing The Seed of the Sacred Fig actress Soheila Golestani from leaving Iran to serve on this year's jury. Golestani was originally unveiled as part of the festival's Tiger Competition jury, alongside Yuki Aditya, Winnie Lau, Peter Strickland and Andrea Luka Zimmerman. More from Deadline Rotterdam Heads Vanja Kaludjercic & Clare Stewart Talk Balancing Mainstream & Niche; Budgets, Dutch Cinema Spurt & Guests Lol Crawley, Cate Blanchett & Mohammad Rasoulof Rotterdam Film Fest Opens With Dutch Crime Comedy 'Fabula' & Plea To Save Historic Cinerama Site 'The Seed Of The Sacred Fig' Actress Soheila Golestani Barred From Leaving Iran To Serve On Rotterdam Jury 'We are saddened but not surprised that Soheila has been unable to leave Iran and join us in Rotterdam for the Tiger Jury — having seen Mohammad's journey with this vital project is to have witnessed time and again the real consequences of speaking truth to power,' said Kaludjercic, referring to director Mohammad Rasoulof. He is currently living in exile in Germany, after fleeing Iran last year, shortly after completing the underground shoot of The Seed of the Sacred Fig. 'Mohammad joins us both to share his film and also participate on a panel about cinema in the face of a rise of authoritarianism — and Soheila's experience underscores how real and urgent these issues are. 'We stand with her in solidarity and hope that she is supported by the global film community at this time — as she is the victim of oppression and a backlash for speaking out that many artists know all too well,' added Kaludjercic. Deadline understands that Golestani has been accused of propaganda against the Iranian regime and promoting immorality because of her role in the film, charges which she denies. The court has been held, but no verdict has been issued yet. Rasoulof is accompanying a screening of his film and is also scheduled to speak on a panel titled 'Cinema and the Rise of Authoritarianism' on February 3. The filmmaker fled Iran last year and is wanted by authorities. He has been sentenced him to eight years in prison alongside a series of physical punishments. The Seed of the Sacred Fig is nominated for Best International Feature Film at the upcoming Oscars and premiered in Cannes last May, where it won the Special Jury Prize. Best of Deadline 'Bridgerton' Season 4: Everything We Know So Far 'Knives Out 3': Everything We Know About The Second Rian Johnson Sequel 2025 Awards Season Calendar: Dates For Oscars, Spirits, Grammys, Tonys, Guilds & More
