Radio Drama (and Other Anomalies)

This will be a bit tangental, so I apologise for the cognitive disonance you may experience. Just buckle up and enjoy the ride. 

When I was in the middle of my childhood private eye/detective phase (which I haven't yet grown out of) I reached the end of my Raymond Chandler books and found myself hungry for more. Chandler used the English language in a way no one else ever has or ever could. He made words both blunt and sharp enough to cut deep.

"Fate stage-managed the whole thing"

"From 30 feet away she looked like a lot of class. From 10 feet away she looked like something made up to be seen from 30 feet away."

"He snorted and hit me in the solar plexus. I bent over and took hold of the room with both hands and spun it. When I had it nicely spinning I gave it a full swing and hit myself on the back of the head with the floor."

"Alcohol is like love. The first kiss is magic, the second is intimate, the third is routine. After that you take the girl's clothes off."

It's one to thing to say "The blonde looked sexy", but it was Chandler who said "It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained glass window."

First edition of Farewell My Lovely, the source of the famous 'bishop window' line.

Why my parents let me read his stuff in high school, I have no idea. The humour and wit of it was addictive.

These pages were oozing sexually promiscuous femme fatales and that unforgettable scene of Marlowe finding a nude woman in his bed. She enraged him. It sure as hell shocked me the way he reacted. If it was James Bond or any other male protagonist he would've bedded her. But not Marlowe - and I suppose that's one of the reasons I adore the character.

Chandler died in 1959, leaving behind a plethora of what could have been. As such I inevitably hit the end of the Marlowe novel and short stories series, which made me greatly depressed for some time. I resorted to rereading the series again and again.

A young Steven Fry. Just kidding! Raymond Chandler looking dapper as always.
(It was this or him with a pipe, really)

It was during my third or fourth rereading of The Big Sleep that my dad came in with a CD collection he had ordered online. This was back when online ordering was relatively new and Amazon.com was the promised land for books for us petty folk on that easily ignored island at the bottom of the globe beside that other easily ignored group of islands. I held this purple odd-sized CD case and thought 'Sweet! Black and White movies!' (I wasn't a normal teenager). As it turns out, it was a mass of audios that were produced in the 40's and 50's from the Golden Age of radio drama. It had The Shadow, Dragnet, Dick Tracy, Sherlock Holmes, but more importantly it had Philip Marlowe. Happy day!

I'll try and spare my gushing about Marlowe for another post and cut right to the chase. Turns out I loved the audios. The fact they were done half a century ago didn't phase me - that's actually a plus in my eyes. I was listening to history not just a Philip Marlowe story. I was putting the CDs in my portable CD player (remember those?) and listened to every single radio drama like an addict. I had just started driving at the time so I also listened in my car, much to my enjoyment and the dismay of my passengers. 

It was called an Old Time Forgotten Radio collection. I never thought of the stories as old, like I don't think of Casablanca as an old film - it's timeless! And these stories weren't forgotten, just being rediscovered.

Today, I listen to several different audio drama series. Some old, like Bulldog Drummond or The Navy Lark. Some new, like Quantum Door and Minister of Chance. And some constant, like The Archers or Doctor Who. 

A full house of Classic Doctors (Doctors in the house...?) continuing their adventures with Big Finish Productions

When listening to Big Finish's Doctor Who audios, it's a little difficult not to picture the already well-photographed and beloved incarnations of the Doctor rather than the grey-haired, more senior but no less beloved actors who play the Doctors. Yes, present tense due to the fact that although their tenure on TV has ended, the characters are still happening on audio. Yes, I am that fussy with my tenses. The advantage to having minimal exposure to the tremendously huge number of talented British actors out there is that I have no idea who previously starred in slapstick comedy and is currently trying to play a Bond Villainesque character with their finger on the 'Blow up the Universe' button. I couldn't point them out in a crowd of one, in other words. So it genuinely feels like the Doctor is encountering total strangers all the time rather than 'that bloke from Eastenders'.

While I'm rabbiting on about British audio drama it would be terribly remiss of me to not to rabbit on about the Minister of Chance. This is a spin-off from 'Death Comes to Time', a Doctor Who audio featuring the Seventh Doctor and Steven Fry as the aforementioned Chancy Minister. Now said Minister is in the talented and capable hands of Julian Wadham. Before I go on to sum up the general premise, let me give you a feel for it with this honest-to-goodness exchange I had with a friend while on lunch break. I had listened to a rather heated scene in the episode titled Paludin Fields, and for reasons that will become clear I had a rather broad grin on my face. It wasn't the first time that week I had been grinning from ear to ear during a rather stressful day and apparantly this baffled my friends  to no end:

FRIEND: What are you smiling about?

ME: Have you ever heard Paul McGann’s voice? It’s like the audible equivalent of crack cocaine.

FRIEND: I thought it was caffeine making you happy.

ME: Nope. Paul McGann’s voice.

Actually, there's a whole lot more to say about The Minister of Chance. The sound design is beautiful. It's audio art at its finest and I can't reccomend it enough. If an entirely empty art gallery only played the soundscape from this series it might be the greatest work of art anyone could experience. The entire cast seem like they're all born for their roles and it's hard to say who steals the show as they all have equally relevant parts with equally powerful dialogue. It's like someone sat down and wrote a mathematical formula for a highly addictive audible sensation and the answer was The Minister of Chance. It was then I discovered just how many people my age and younger enjoyed audio drama as much as I do. They might have skipped over the Golden Age but they embrace the new stuff. Like a Classic Whovian with New Whovians at a Sci-Fi convention. Same destination, different journey. Countless nerdy things to discuss!

Why am I talking so indepth about The Minister of Chance when I've rather breezed over everything else? Well, Minister of Chance is professionally produced, but it's produced almost entirely by its fans.  If you want to look into it a bit more, check out the website where you can download episodes entirely free of charge (thanks to donators). Enjoy the audible equivalent of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. If you like what you hear, perhaps spare what you can or aquire some awesome merch to help the series continue!

The audio equivalent of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

And now a disclaimer:

Before you think I'm an Anglophile of sorts, bear in mind I think William Shatner's voice is pretty damn good too. I could listen to him speak all day. And a wonderful Australian voice would be Anthony Warlow. If he isn't entrancing people with his warm operatic baritone on stage, he's making them melt with his wonderfully smooth honey-like voice. Fortunately he is at present gracing the boards on Broadway so more people can enjoy his dulcet tones. If I could get all three to do one audio drama, it may culminate in the greatest sound known to mankind - and the world might explode.

Long story short, yeah it's not million-dollar budget blockbusters, but neither are books. And like books they let the imagination go about as crazy as a Beatles video clip. Each experience is individual. Each time you hit 'repeat' you get a different feel for it. Audio drama provides the sound, you create your own blockbuster.

Give Us a Sporting Chance

I'm going to take off my obscure Music/TV Series/Books hat off for a moment and throw a particular scarf around my neck and pull a gurnsey over my chest and wear some colours proudly.

Yes, I am a supporter of a particular sports team. In fact, I have a few sports teams in different codes that I follow. That's because I love sport.

I love the feeling of winning. I love cheering until my throat goes hoarse. I love sitting amongst a crowd of thousands and feeling like my willing them on equates to me playing a pivotol part in their victory. I hate the losses and knowing I feel them harder than the players do. I love watching history happen every weekend.

On an average day I can sit down and watch darts, snooker, cricket, soccer/football, NFL, Rugby, Athletics, curling or lawn bowls and enjoy it. I go bunta during the Olympics and Paralympics when there are sports I don't see every day - like Goalball or the Modern Pentathlon.

The sport that consumes most of my attention is Australian Rules Football, affectionately known as 'footy'. It's traditionally played on cricket grounds, has 2 goal posts and 2 point posts, and is very different to the European code of football - and no, it's not Rugby. There's a footy oval in just about every suburb and on a winter's day you couldn't drive anywhere without passing a game. It's hard not to be pulled into the frenzy that is football.

My club is Port Adelaide Football Club. I support the local league (SANFL) team - the Magpies, and the national league (AFL) team - the Power. Two different names and uniforms, but the same club.

I grew up in the Port Adelaide area, my parents grew up in Port Adelaide; my grandparents migrants from Italy and Belgium and embraced the local team. It's a common story for many sports: barracking for the local club because that's what you do.

Being a real supporter isn't about going where the success is; it's about pride in your home town no matter where you are in the world. Having said that many people go for teams in a city they've never been to: fine by me so long as you don't turn your back on them because they're not winning. A team is for life, not the fair weather.

The Port Adelaide Football Club's Magpies team - SANFL Grand Final, Football Park, 1999

The Port Adelaide Football Club's Power team - AFL Grand Final, Melbourne Cricket Ground, 2004


Two different teams - both are one club.


Right, moving on:

For all its good points about pride, passion and local patriotism, sport sometimes resembles an atomic bomb sitting on a coffee table and a few people sit around it. There'll always be one trying to poke the button that sets the bomb off. Those kind of people make me enjoy sport a little less. They take great pleasure in the misery of the opposition. There will never ever be an acceptable excuse for bullying supporters or making them feel unsafe at a game. There are certain games of the year I do my best to avoid because of horrible experiences I have had with opposition supporters, and I'm not saying all those in my club's colours are angels either. It's sad when a day out with the family turns into a horrible time for all concerned especially when sport can be so much better.

Australian football has recently tackled swearing and inappropriate behaviour at games and it's improving. They are now addressing acceptance of homosexuality and an increase of female umpires at national level. This is a sport I get behind because of the social responsibilities the league (not always the teams themselves) accepts. For kids to see women involved in the matches or hearing their heros tell them being gay is okay - it can only be positive.

The involvement of females at top levels of Australian Rules is increasing.

Sport is one of the best things we have to prove humanity is worth having faith in. If aliens came from on high and demanded evidence our selfish lives are worth saving, I'd enter sport as Exhibit B. It's a unifying experience. See the Olympics and Paralympics as a prime example of what we're capable of. Warring sides embrace one another in mutual respect long before political leaders do (or ever will).

I'm no expert in every sport, but I follow what I can where I can. News that affects a team on the other side of the world sure as hell captures my attention. I followed and put in hours of research into the Hillsborough inquiry when that exploded through international news. There was a trickle on our side of the world but most of it I got from twitter. The Premier League isn't just half a world away from me geographically, I couldn't tell you a key player in any team and I could possibly list off maybe four teams I know of in the League. Still, as a sports fan, it mattered to me.

At the same time - literally the same week - as the inquiry's findings were published, a player from my club died suddenly in tragic circumstances. As the news spread supporters and players from other clubs offered their support. The AFL finals were still being played but finalists offered their condolences to the club and its supporters. I was contantly faced with news updates, some media speculating drugs were involved, graphic descriptions of the death from witnesses. And in the middle of the shock and grief there I was reading about 96 supporters killed in a tragedy 23 years ago. I could only imagine what it would have been like 23 years ago. No matter the fenzy in the press, in both instances the players and supporters rallied. And they always will rally when something terrible happens to one of their own.

A sporting tragedy should affect every sports fan.

Then there was the Bali Bombings ten years ago that killed 88 Australians and 202 people in total. Several footy players of various grades celebrating their end of season were caught up in the blasts. Some country clubs were completely torn asunder. Their communities banded together and even top level players raised money to help out the families affected. One AFL player was horribly burned but managed to couragiously return the following year, proudly wearing the number of Aussies lost over his heart. The crowd at that comeback game - didn't matter if he was on your team or not - were on their feet. Not a dry eye in a stadium of more than forty thousand.

I was touched when I read of London Bombing surivors competing at the Paralympics.

It's in our genes no matter who or where we are.

Sport does that to us. It pulls us from the worst times of our lives to achieve the greatest triumph we could imagine.

I belong somewhere in an army of thousands, in a sea of teal, black and white.

Why I love my sport so much is because at the best of times I can go to a game, sit beside a supporter of the opposition, and no matter the outcome we talk about the game and leave with a smile. I belong somewhere in an army of thousands, in a sea of teal, black and white.

I could be the only one flying the banner for my cause; but no matter what, I'll never walk alone.

Bulldog Drummond's Many, Many Rounds

Stop me if you've heard this one before: An Englishman with inexhaustible income fights to stop terrorists and communists from invading British soil, drives a British-made car, occasionally travels to other countries and enjoys a drink or several on his days off.

A long time ago I was staying interstate in a hotel. I had come to compete in an athletics competition. My training partner had Uni assignments to address so she wasn't terribly sociable company, so I raided the small bookshelf in the room full of yellowed 2nd hand books. Out of the romance novel drivels and bible, I picked up a book that looked particularly hardboiled detective-ish called 'The Third Round' by a bloke called 'Sapper', which I took for a particularly witty pseudonym.

It wasn't Chandler but it pulled me in like an anchor dropped into the ocean. The language was so full of 1920's English slang I almost needed a dictionary, I had no idea who the characters were, and it read like I was catching the penultimate episode of a TV series but I didn't care. The action, but more importantly, the characters and the way it was written kept me turning the pages.

The story, for me, started half way through the series. I had to go back and fill in the gaps.

The creator of said characters, Herman Cyril McNeile (turns out it was a pseudonym) knew how to make novels read like a good movie. No wonder most of the books were turned into films shortly after publication. McNeile's friend Gerard Farlie would take over the stories after McNeile's death. While McNeile's books have recently seen a republication in the early 2000's, I'm still waiting for Farlie's novels (which includes one of my favourites: 'Bulldog Drummond on Dartmoor') to see a reprinting at some point.

The day after picking up 'The Third Round', I brought the book to the running track. I got a personal best time but didn't make the final of my event. For once I wasn't bummed out because it meant I could read more. And thus did I fall in love with Bulldog (Hugh) Drummond - Simon Templar’s dad and James Bond's grandfather - One of the most tangental problem solvers in the history of English literature (predating Doctor Who, mind).

Drummond is a de-listed soldier from The First World War who risked life and limb in the defence of Mother England. His bold actions in the service earned him followers during peacetime. Like a few distinguished veterans, he fails to adjust to a quiet routine of normality, so he dives headlong (or fist-first) into other people's problems in his continued quest to defend Great Britain from her enemies. The fact he has a disposable income helps him avoid a normal 9 to 5 job, and rather than file paperwork, he gets to do interesting stuff like diving through windows, kicking down doors and participating in gunfights. In the 1960's films they gave him a job and a modest income but he gets pulled into the fracas with only the occasional reminder of it.

I think there's a reason Drummond has graced everything from radio to film and comic books. He is probably more personable than James Bond, with moments of Wodehouse woven in. There's such a variety in each story you can honestly never tell what will happen next. There's something for everyone. If you like a clever chemist/inventor, there's several. If you like a monocled aristocrat getting in over his head, or the odd amount of female hostage-taking; even wincingly painful torture, car chases, phone tapping, poisoning, political intrigue and explosions. There's also a couple of first-person narratives thrown in as well if you get too cosy in third-person. Fun for the whole family! (Torture scenes aside...)

My favourite Drummond black & white, mostly because of the epic sword battle at the end.

"You priceless old bean, I gathered from the female bird punching the what-not outside that the great brain was heaving - but my dear old lad, I have come to report a crime..."

- Drummond to a police friend in 'The Black Gang' (1922) by H.C. McNeile

Like Sherlock Holmes before him, Drummond has a nemesis in Carl Peterson. Peterson is a master of disguise with power and political influence. His lady, Irma, replaces him later on as Drummond's main antithesis. Yes, folks, a strong female antagonist heading a crime syndicate pre-women's lib. You go girl! (She develops into my favourite fictional female in Female of the Species) Seriously, think about it: In 1928, in the same novel series that has a female getting kidnapped by brutes every other weekend, there was a beautiful and intelligent (albeit vengeful) woman the main character (a man mountain) and his gang of ex-servicemen struggle to defeat.

As Rudyard Kipling put it: 'the female of the species is more deadly than the male'.

Reprints of the 'Sapper' books like this are easy enough to find online or in bookstores.

Unlike Sherlock Holmes, Drummond is a sociable fellow with a large group of friends who vary through the stories. A core pair is Algy Longworth and Peter Darrell. Unlike James Bond, Drummond approaches life with levity. He saves the world with a smile, a fist like a wrecking ball and with a tankard of beer in his free hand. He is laid back right up to the climax and then snaps into action; get on the wrong side of his temper, and you may end up rather broken. As an ex-soldier he knows how to move silently, shoot accurately and, rather exotically, he employs a form of martial art that breaks a fellow's neck on the odd occasion.

Dive into Bulldog Drummond for action, adventure, pub-crawling, devious enemies, nonchalant smoking (almost constantly) and ribald humour topped off with patriotism so British it drinks Twinings, salutes the Union Jack even on napkins, and believes 'God Save the Queen' is the greatest poetic achievement to mankind.

A recent comic book adaption of Bulldog Drummond that finished with an interesting twist.

Don't dive into Bulldog Drummond if you expect current day political correctness. Bear in mind it was the 1920's and 30's so don't take any of the gender stereotypes, racial insensitivity or antisemitism personally. I embrace the books as a light-hearted blokish romp into the past rather than a manifesto for a glorious British master race.

You don't have to be British to appreciate the elements that make McNeile's/Farlie's stories great. There were times I had to reread a couple of sentences because I naturally read with a South Australian accent, which doesn't suit sentences ending in 'what' (they continue to baffle me no end), or every sentence uttered by a cockney.

The things that set Bulldog Drummond apart from most literary heroes are why I like him and his menagerie to bits.

• Their approach to problem-solving always includes beer.
• Their main method of communication is slang banter much akin to a locker room prior to a rugby match.
• Drummond drives a Bentley. It would only be cooler if it was a Frazer Nash. (He did have a brand new Rolls-Royce, but that didn't end well...)

What I really enjoy about the series is the evil guys are often two-faced. They help people with one hand while plotting the destruction of the British Empire with the other. Some even start off sympathising with the good guys and you don't realise they're evil until the final chapter or two at the inevitable finale fisticuffs.To me that seems far more believable than 'let's plonk this non-English person here and make them evil for no greater purpose than this story needs a baddie'. Hell, even over time I found myself starting to sympathise with this intentionally hideously described hunchback who murders a friend of Drummond's. Drummond retaliates by rather brutally assaulting the fellow. These caricatures of nastiness aren't really caricatures. Carl Peterson comes close, being the type to truss up his enemy then recite his entire plan for world domination, but he does it because his ego requires it. Besides, his dry wit and intelligence sets him apart from the more melodramatic of his cohort.

Carl Peterson in full colour in the 60's film 'Deadlier Than the Male'.

 "Why, I remember once, that I was so incredibly foolish as to replace the cork in a bottle of prussic acid after I had - er - compelled a gentleman to drink the contents. He was in bed at the time, and everything pointed to suicide, except that confounded cork. I mean, would any man, after he's drunk sufficient prussic acid to poison a regiment, go and cork up the empty bottle?"

- Carl Peterson to a paralysed Drummond in 'The Black Gang' (1922) by H.C. McNeile

I guess what I'm trying to say is the characters in these books make the stories come alive. The enjoyment of the adventure becomes more than just beating the nasties and saving the girl, but following two parallel stories and watching them slug it out at the end. Sometimes you even spend most of the plot following the bads around. Will Eisner went on to do this a fair bit in his 'The Spirit' comics and I love those as well (READ THEM!! - no pressure...)

In 1941, Bulldog Drummond moved to the United States and settled in on the radio waves there for more than 20 adventures.

Bulldog Drummond's influence on current British literature is shown with a thinly disguised appearance as a thug (along with thinly disguised Emma Peel and James Bond) in the popular graphic novel series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Despite making him an elderly racist grumpy thug, props to Alan Moore for embracing the character; but until Moore cuts his hair and beard and looks less like Rasputin, I remain terrified for my life should I ever see him in person.

It has been said in forewords that Drummond inspired a great deal of British and American literary heroes, much like John Carter of Mars spurring essentially the entire superhero genre when he was first published in 1912.

I always seem to be attracted to where a literary craze begins - rather unintentionally. But I wouldn't want it any other way. Give me my Martians, my trench coat-suited masked vigilantes and beer-swigging ex-soldiers any day!

Seventeen Moments in Twelve Parts

If you read the blog post previous, you may have noted in the opening paragraph I mentioned an obscure TV show called 'Seventeen Moments of Spring' or 'Semnadtsat mgnoveniy vesny' if your Russian is better than mine. I called it the best TV drama to come out of the Soviet Union. I don't presume to let that statement go unqualified so allow me to introduce you to the television brilliance that is this little 12-part espionage drama.

Opening Titles: 'By commission of State Committee of the USSR Council of Ministers on Television and Radio Broadcasting' - something we don't see too often at the start of our regular TV programming...

I can't profess to be an expert on how television was put together in the USSR during the 70's. But when the heartfelt intro song is playing and an official government approval is stamped onscreen at the opening credits, you get a vague idea of what it could be. To us historical nerds, we call this a primary source as it gives a glimpse into life in the Soviety Union, at least via television broadcast. 'Seventeen Moments of Spring' is probably one of the most popular TV series in Russian history.

Despite the title informing us the State is responsible for making what we're about to see, you'll be pleasantly surprised it isn't all propaganda. You can choose to completely ignore the subtle patriotic moments if you want and treat it as just another black and white World War Two espionage drama.

Seventeen Moments is set in the final 17 days before the end of the Second World War. It centres around a Soviet spy, Maxim Isaev, who has deeply infiltrated Nazi Germany under the guise of Max Otto von Stierlitz. He discreetly sabotages the efforts of the Nazi Party as they attempt to discreetly broker a peace with the West. This would give Germany a singular focus: the Eastern Front and create a bit of grief to the Soviet Union's war efforts. In the meantime, Stierlitz has to constantly watch his back and fend off any suspicious looks he might gain from the uniformed Nazi officers around him.

Our first view of the hero standing alone in a forest, in a deeply contemplative mood.

Stierlitz, played very deadpan yet rather touchingly by Vyacheslav Vasilyevich Tikhonov, is a dedicated Soviet citizen, depicted as bravely risking his life for his homeland by out-espionaging the Nazis. He has a handful of allies to assist him, but they run the risk of compromising the Soviet spy more than once. Even when fingers are pointed towards our hero and Stierlitz faces torture or worse, he remains calm, controlled and... damn those eyes. You just want to hug the guy when he's seated alone, lost in his thoughts, and quite possibly facing a nasty demise. I don't know how but Tikhonov says so much whenever he has no dialogue. Must be the eyes. The USSR's answer to Humphrey Bogart with the grey-tinged fringe of Scott Bakula.

Stierlitz had rather thorough deductive reasoning which is shown both in Tikhonov's actions and the dead-pan narration accompanying most of the dialogue-less moments of the series. Due to the popularity of the character this has spun into some rather clever jokes in Russia, spanning its own genre of jokes still to this day. 

For example: Stierlitz opened a door. The lights went on. Stierlitz closed the door. The lights went out. Stierlitz opened the door again. The light went back on. Stierlitz closed the door. The light went out again. "It's a refrigerator," concluded Stierlitz.

And: One day, Stierlitz wore Red Army uniform, took a Red Flag and marched down Prinz-Albrecht-Straße singing The Internationale. Never has he been so close to failure.

Joking aside, I march on to more gushing praise for the series...

I first became aware of the series when the Australian news networks kicked up a surprisingly huge fuss around Tikhonov's passing in 2009. I lived out in a desert at the time and with no DVD store or much choice of TV channels, I ventured online and watched parts of Seventeen Moments on YouTube. I eventually acquired the whole series on DVD when I discovered the full set was available with subtitles. There's also a colourised version that was shown some time after the original. It's nice to see as an aside, but about 10 to 20 minutes are cut from each episode.

The DVDs with English Subtitles are easy to obtain from online retailers such as Amazon.com.

I realised this show is popular for a reason. It was heartfelt, intense but kudos to Tikhonov for making it human and realistic. It wasn't a James Bond espionage with shiny ladies and sexy cars, it was how it should be: silent, conspiratorial, heart-wrenching and at times, tense. The narrator, who pretty much runs the show, gives you insight into Stierlitz's thoughts as though you were reading a live-action book (funnily enough, the series is based on a book of the same name...).

Stierlitz interrogates a Nazi prisoner. A singular challenge when prisoners know who he really is.

I won't go on about the plot as you can find a synopsis anywhere (or better yet, watch the series!), but I'll pick out a few points that stand out for me and make this series worth watching.

Firstly, Tikhonov is awesome. It genuinely feels like the actor bares his all in this.
Secondly, the side-plot with Stierlitz bravely protecting his contacts at risk of his own life.
Thirdly, Stierlitz having a tearful reunion with his wife after years apart from her. I say 'tearful' mostly on my part. I cried as the sombre piano music played, and the pair looked at one another from across the room of a cafe. Due to Stierlitz's cover he is unable to speak with her. He can only watch her enter with another man, have a coffee, and then leave. End of reunion.
Forthly, someone has been leaking intel. Fingerprints point to Stierlitz. He is thrown into an interrogation room with various devices of torture scattered around. Will he get out?
Fifthly, the Red Army is marching to Berlin and as the 17 days draw to a close. The inevitability gets all the more poignant with the Nazi officers, some of whom are actually fairly likable and have befriended Stierlitz.

Will Stierlitz's Nazi colleagues trigger his downfall...?

...Or will his civilian contacts risk his cover to save themselves?

If you do have the time/interest/inclination, I highly recommend giving this series a go. There's something for everybody except perhaps small children and axolotls.

Language Barriers, Jacques Brel, and Modern Chanson

Ever avoided seeing a movie or show because it's in another language and as such you wouldn't enjoy it? I personally don't believe in putting on blinkers when it comes to foreign language experiences. I love languages. I grew up monolinguistic and that's probably the one thing I really regret in my life, but I don't let it put me off foreign movies, shows or music. If I restricted myself to only English viewing I'd have missed 'Seventeen Moments of Spring' the best TV drama out of the Soviet Union, or 'Goodbye Lenin!' a beautiful piece of social commentary, or the heartfelt warbles of of Edith Piaf, or Wagner's epic Ring Cycle. The world would indeed be very hollow if language was standardised. It plays such a big part in our art and culture that were we all on the same page, there'd be nothing unique in the world.

I'm going to use the Belgian chanteur Jacques Brel as an example of why we shouldn't be narrow minded in our exposure to things, and to shine some light on a brilliant artist little-known in the English-Speaking world. I'm going to employ clips, lyrics and words to try and illustrate my point and hopefully introduce you to a whole new perspective of music and hopefully language too.

Brel specialised in a singing style commonly known as modern chanson. Originating from the epic poems of ancient times, chanson (meaning 'song' in French) is a type of lyric-driven song. The vocals follow the French rhythm of speech. As a result of this some English translations have instances when vocals seem fast or awkwardly syncopated. Modern chanson is usually performed by a solo artist and sets itself apart from most contemporary French singers who write music to the pattern of English speech.

If you go away, as I know you will,
You must tell the world to stop turning till
You return again – if you ever do
 For what good is love without loving you?

- English lyrics from Jacques Brel's Ne Me Quitte Pas

I can't do justice to just how good Brel's lyrics are because English can't do them justice.  How can I understand the words of his songs if I can't understand French? It's difficult to explain but music has emotion; a song tells a story. Imagine watching Valhalla burn while the gods sing their souls to pieces in German. The language is irrelevant, we're witnessing an awesome tragedy here. I sat in the audience during the G3 2012 Australian Tour when solo guitarist Steve Vai held the crowd by the tip of his guitar pick without uttering a single word. At the time I had no idea who the guy was. It didn't matter if we weren't fans, he knew how to take us along for the ride. The tl;dr message is music is universal.

I put together a little clip as an example. The song below is 'J'Arrive', probably one of the more orchestral songs Jaques Brel recorded. You can get a sense of the emotion and movement in the music as well as in Brel's voice. When he performed he always threw his whole body into it, he became the characters he sang about. There was no difference between a packed theatre or a recording studio: if he was singing his heart was in it. He grasped the audience with both hands and didn't let go until the music fell silent.

I once saw a cabaret artist who performed several Brel songs in their original French. She translated some lyrics for her predominately monolinguistic audience, and I had tears in my eyes they were so touching. It was like someone looked deep into your soul, found the most painfully beautiful image you could comprehend, and put it into words.

I have several DVDs of Brel's live performances (with subtitles) but thanks to the wonders of the internet, you can go to YouTube and find similar fan made clips with subtitles. He wrote on a wide range of subjects, some hilarious, some heartbreaking; all worth listening to. My personal favourite is Quand on n'a que l'amour. Below is an example of one of the videos you can find. It made me realise French isn't too different to English in the grand scheme of things.

Jacques Brel was born in Belgium, made a name for himself and exploded into France with a vengeance on stage, then later in TV and film. He died in 1978 of lung cancer at the age of 49, but he crammed so much into his life that you can't help but be left awed: singing, writing, acting, composing, directing, sailing, flying (to name only a few).

The musical revue 'Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris' was one of the first attempts to bring Brel's songs to America in 1968. It consisted of a core selection of Brel's songs, translated and interpreted into English. The show did well Off-Broadway and inspired a film made in 1975, in which Jacques Brel makes a cameo appearance. In 1995 There was a UK production of the show. In 2006 'Jacques Brel' was revived Off-Broadway with added portions of French and Flemish lyrics, often echoing the English words. All 3 aforementioned productions have CDs available.

Brel was one of the first mainstream performers to sing about adult subjects, delve deep into the personal, dark and emotional pits of the human condition. He masticated the human race and spat it back out rather unceremoniously. A great number of his songs were anti-war or hard-hitting or filled with trauma, but there were just as many that made you laugh or cry or hug the total stranger sitting beside you, because the human race isn't so horrible after all. In France he is a legend. In Belgium there's a museum dedicated to him. Were it not for the language barrier he could have been huge in the English-Speaking world.

But sooner or later every generation eventually discovers Jacques Brel - if not by his performances, by his name. Olivia Newton-John, Tom Jones, The Seekers, David Bowie, Céline Dion, Cyndi Lauper, Frank Sinatra, Neil Diamond - they've all recorded songs written by Jacques Brel.

In 1970 David Bowie recorded an English version of 'Amsterdam', one of Brel's most popular songs.

 If you are interested in Brel, please, please, please listen to his songs in their original French (sometimes Flemish). That is how they were intended to be heard. To me it's a respect issue in regards to the artist. By all means go listen to the songs of 'Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris' if you want, but don't overlook the originals! The meaning of a poem often gets lost in translation, and that's what Brel's songs are: poetry. Language doesn't obscure talent, ignorance does.

There's no point in me even finishing this as Brel used the imagery of words so much better than I could. And so, dear reader, in parting I leave you with Brel's version of 'Amsterdam'.

Lt. Columbo or: How I Learned to Stop Judging & Love Peter Falk

When I was in high school, my parents decided to get Foxtel, which is a kind of Pay TV available in Australia. What I remember Foxtel giving us was about 30 channels of crap, 3 channels of occasionally interesting movies, and Columbo.

It all started late one school night in winter. I had done my homework like the good little angel I am (I can hear my parents laughing five suburbs away) and for a treat, mum flicked over to a part-way through episode of something. Mum and Dad both reacted favourably to whatever was on. As far as I was concerned, I was watching a rumpled old man with a squinty eye questioning another old man with grey hair and a moustache about his dot-matrix printer.

Columbo was different to other murder/mystery shows. You see the murderer commit his crime, then after the commercial break, you watch this questionably awake policeman work out who did it. He didn’t always know how, but he got who right. I actually liked this new method of mystery story, officially called 'the inverted detective format'. It didn't make me feel stupid. In fact, you knew more than the detective - which is probably where the appeal lies.

Don't judge a book by its cover, or a 1959 Peugeot 403 convertible by its oxidation.

Peter Falk wasn’t the first person to play the character of Columbo on TV - Bert Freed was the first. No offence to Freed, but when people think of the police detective, very few think of the villain in the TV series 'Shane'. To give the man credit, though, he originated the character and one must always pay homage to the originals. On that note, the man who took Columbo to the live stage, Thomas Mitchell, also deserves a mention.

So when Falk stepped up to the role, it was a second-hand gig. He wasn't even the writers' first or second choice. Despite that, he made the character his own, and made him an immortal legend of television. I read somewhere that Falk pretty much played himself. As for the squinty eye, I soon found out the actor had a glass eye. Columbo's costume was the actor's own wardrobe and I don't recall anyone styling Columbo's hair (except for one episode with a hairdresser).

There was something about Lieutenant Columbo. So long as you weren't a murderer he'd wave hello and wish you a nice day. Even if you were a murderer, he'd share a glass of wine with you and shake your hand just before the squad car comes to take you away. Sometimes there'd be a sadness in his eyes when a cold-blooded but rather likeable killer is taken away in cuffs. Nice people, poor choices.

"Lt. Columbo. Homicide."

Columbo is an everyman police homicide detective. He drove a car you needed a tetanus shot just to look at, he had a rumpled appearance and reveals more than once how little he earns. The show constantly dealt with wealthy killers, so having this dishevelled working-class question mark roaming about huge Hollywood mansions was a regular entertainment. This is a show about murder, mind you.

Well, it is but it isn't. The thing I like is it doesn't dwell too much on the hard stuff. A corrupt woman or an innocent guy get killed in premeditation or fury and that's it. You never sit through the trauma of a victim's impact statement or see a husband break apart at the morgue.

The thing I'm trying to say is it isn't about the murder. It's about following Columbo, watching his reactions, listening to his words. Over time I got good enough to pick the precise moment he suspects a killer. It could be right at the beginning or moments to the end. Either way, he gets his man - or woman.

Sometimes it could be cleverly psychological, like one episode when we see the murderer plan how to cover up his crime through the reflection on his glasses (probably makes sense in context...) or a woman plans to kill her brother and we hear the voices of police offers after the fact. One killer sinks into an alter ego, a confident seductress she dresses up as to top off her unfaithful boyfriend, going so far as to send taunting messages to Columbo along the way.

She planned it well...

But Columbo saw the newspaper left on the nightstand.

Every long-running series has better episodes than others. It spanned from the late 1960’s right to the early 2000’s. While regular episodes stopped around 1989, they were still produced right up until 2003. I won't list off my best and worst Columbo episodes because, like a large family, I am compelled to love them all. Some simply stand out as more extroverted than others. I enjoy the ones with music, colour and movement. The one on the cruise ship, in London, in a restaurant surrounded by food, in a film studio etc.

Columbo dining in style.

Like Poirot or Marple to British actors, Columbo was the American Murder/Mystery box to be ticked. I recall Leslie Nielson in two appearances, William Shatner twice being a murderer, Ricardo Montalbán as a man-killing matador, Leonard Nimoy playing a conniving Doctor who kills a nurse. Even Johnny Cash appeared in one as a gospel/country singer. I won't go into the full list of special guests, seeing as you can peruse it at your leisure.

If you're ever curious to learn more about the man, I have to say Peter Falk's autobiography is an entertaining read. I got it a few years ago, just before news broke of his Alzheimer's. I really enjoyed the way it was written. Imagine yourself sitting in an armchair with a cup of tea one sunny Sunday arvo. Sitting opposite you is Peter Falk, smiling jovially and also holding a cup of tea. Turns out he's put the kettle on and invited you around to his place for a chat. He's spread out an array of old and new photographs on the coffee table and begins to tell you stories about them. Not necessarily in chronological order, but stories about his life, career and all the stuff you want to know about. That's how it's written and I love it.

Peter Falk invites the reader around to his place for a cup of tea and a chat.

Columbo rarely relied on DNA, fingerprints or all that sort of microscopic data modern shows are compelled to use for verisimilitude. Anything, like a piece of flint from a lighter, an answering machine message, a word document on a computer - those sorts of things were the alibi breakers in Columbo stories.

I guess this is the part where I head to a conclusion somewhere before your eyes glaze over. Even if a show is from the 60's or 70's and the clothes look disgusting, don't judge a book by its cover. Shows don't need glossy props or flashy sets to be enjoyable - they need endearing characters and good writing. Promise me, if you ever see this dishevelled character on your TV in future, give him a chance to win you over.

Blog Post the First - Nerds and Their Docudramas

In case you've been living on an iceberg the past few months, you'd be aware it's been 100 years since the sinking of the Titanic. For historical nerds like myself, we get a tad excited by anniversaries of major events due to the increase in documentaries that come out. We care little for the James Cameron epic in 3D due to massive inaccuracies (but we forgive Cameron because he has produced a documentary as penance. Check out the recreation of the sinking he put together with his CGI crew).

When I was a cherub in primary school (my mother scoffs at my use of the word ‘cherub’), I would read Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie and historical books. Yes, I was indeed the coolest person in the back corner of the library. While I was wondering where my friends were, I became fascinated about the Titanic. I was ll years old and the film had just come out. Although I didn’t give much of a toss about the movie, the hype was enough to spark a fascination for me that has lasted more than a decade.

So in this centennial year, and now a mature adult, I would embrace the influx of new documentaries like they were cherished loved ones, and I would run screaming from ‘Raise the Titanic’ like it was a leprotic axe murderer coughing up bile.

I ended up turning my interest to the first cab off the rank: a barely-hyped docudrama about the 1912 British Inquiry which, either by luck or design, the History Channel in Australia picked up from BBC1 Northern Ireland. It was so quietly placed in the programming that, were it not for fans of lead actor Paul McGann, I probably would have missed it.

I knew 2 post-disaster inquiries were held: one in the U.S. within days of the survivors' arrival in New York, and a much bigger one in the U.K. less than a month later, but they were rarely addressed in documentaries or books. Now my interest was piqued. And for half a week I did what every self-respecting historical nerd would do: I downloaded the entire transcript (959 pages officially, 2,095 in MS Word) and read the full British Inquiry. If you're at all interested, you can read the transcript online via the Titanic Inquiry Project. You know the stuff you read in the books or heard in the documentaries? Most of it came from those testimonies.

And now with my brain full of Edwardian Perry Mason, I watched ‘The Titanic Inquiry’ (‘SOS – Titanic Inquiry’ in the U.K.). The one-hour docudrama focuses entirely on the Californian conspiracy in a Reader’s Digest version of Days 7 and 8 of the inquiry. Sir Rufus Isaacs' opening statement (taken from Day 1) is cut down to only a few lines, and the Commissioner’s verdict (taken from Day 36) is only a tiny portion of his findings which also dealt with lifeboats, evacuation procedures, passenger and crew behaviour, emergencies at sea, inefficient watertight compartments, and more. They do feature a scene early on outside the courtroom where Robertson Dunlop, the lawyer for the Californian's crew, discusses the inquiry so far. He gives the impression things are bigger than what they seem.

“They do not relish taking all the blame for the insufficient number of lifeboats... They may try and deflect attention in another direction.”

For those unaware of the SS Californian, she was a ship apparently only a handful of miles away from the Titanic when she sank. The captain is believed to have ignored the Titanic's distress flares and wireless calls for help. Vital evidence was lost prior to both inquiries so to this day questions remain concerning the Californian's true whereabouts and her crew's actions that night.

"Really try and do yourself justice."

While Isaacs didn’t personally question everyone like in the docudrama, he did question Captain Stanley Lord. The scathing ‘Do just think!’ and ‘Really try to do yourself justice’ were uttered by him to press Lord's ambiguous responses. Even without clear evidence, Lord had his name publicly tarnished and lost his captaincy. He soon resurrected his career, though. He was the Robert Downey Jr. of 1912.

"These are answers that do not do you the least good, and they are not the answers that you want."

The good thing about the docudrama is that the courtroom scenes are more or less faithfully recreated from the transcript. Obviously chunks of banter had to be cut for the sake of time and coherency, but the lines that remain are as they were a century ago.

However, it was a shame to overlook the Californian wireless operator, particularly due to the fact his absence creates a big gaping plot hole (why, if they saw rockets, was the operator not summoned to his post?). This was something Isaacs and his team touched on in the actual inquiry, and they questioned the Marconi Operator, Cyril Evans. He had been asleep at the time and apparently no one asked him to man his post until an hour or so after the sinking.

I’m willing to let this omission slide because of time constraints. As the courtroom scenes are intercut with outside conversations between the Californian crew members, I’ll assume that the issue of the wireless operator was settled in those unseen moments.

"The Second Officer remarked to me, 'Look at her now; she looks very queer out of the water; her lights look queer.'"

In the days since watching this docudrama, I've studied the transcripts further and reread the books I have with a whole new insight. I even opened my box of replica Titanic paperwork and discovered one of the large posters, a cutaway of the ship, is the same version they used in the British Inquiry. And so my fascination with the tragedy has grown once more.

A century later, questions still remain concerning the Californian and her crew's conduct.

When The Titanic Inquiry aired on the evening of the 14th, I watched it with 3 sports nuts (I claimed the TV mid-football game). By the time the credits rolled all 4 of us were debating who we thought was responsible. So on that level the production achieved its intention: inform and entertain. It provoked a discussion that lasted longer than the program itself. It didn't matter how much everyone knew, we all had an opinion for or against the Californian. In the end the football game was forgotten.

I remain in awe of how a one-hour docudrama reignited a fire kindled long ago in a school library. It challenges those who think they know the facts. It divides opinion and it shows us glimpses of a much, much bigger story.

And there's little doubt, in the middle of all this TV and online hype, another 11 year-old has begun their journey of discovery just like I did. Keep an eye out for their blog in the years to come.