Wednesday 7th January  12:06 pm Good Afternoon

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Nelson's Column January Boo! Hiss! 14th January 2008 The role of the struggling actor just got harder Earlier this week, Arts Council head Peter Hewitt put on the year’s least popular stage show in living memory. His matinee at the Young Vic in Ken Livingstone’s “We’re Cutting All Your Funding and Spending it on the Olympics” met with a chorus of boos from an audience that included Sir Ian McKellen, Kevin Spacey, Joanna Lumley, Richard Briers, Caroline Quentin, Sheila Hancock and Jonathan Pryce. Sheffield Theatre’s director Sam West even leapt onto stage to express his disapproval. It’s not just regional theatres that are suffering from the cuts – Richmond’s Orange Tree is losing nearly a fifth of its funding, and The Bush is set to suffer a potentially fatal 40% cut. And yet… in a couple of weeks, the giant Lyttleton Theatre at the National, a tenth of whose funding would probably keep the Bush going for a decade is to put on a production of Peter Handke’s 'The Hour We Knew Nothing of Each Other', which they describe as: “Twenty-seven actors, 450 characters and no dialogue: a play without words by the great experimental figure of European theatre.” To you this might mean very little: an easy decision to steer well clear of the National Theatre for a month or so and rave reviews in The Guardian and Time Out to read and shake your head at. It’s a little tougher on those of us who occasionally get called upon to write reviews, since there’s always a risk of having to actually sit through the bloody thing, trying to think of something nice to say about it, since it’s clearly Art. Bur more importantly, this kind of grimly self-important theatrical navel-gazing is a quite extraordinary way to spend a subsidy. No dialogue? 450 characters? Could you not just sit on Eros and watch the tourists bumping into each other around Piccadilly Circus to get that kind of entertainment? And then there’s opera, which currently absorbs about a sixth of London’s arts budget so that fat hedge fund managers can take a break from their mistresses and treat their wives to a night of exquisitely tasteful boredom. Or contemporary dance, which is either dull or pornographic. And while I’m quite happy with the latter, I’m not sure I really need quite so much of my income tax to be spent on it. The process by which theatres’ subsidies are calculated currently makes about as much sense as a Beckett monologue. I propose a simpler method: for every use of the word ‘abstract’, ‘experimental’, ‘ground-breaking’, ‘avant garde’, or ‘wordless’ in a review of a show, the theatre gets 1% of its subsidy passed on to a smaller venue. And ‘physicality’, ‘serio-comic’ and ‘radical’ count for double. Problem solved. Off the streets, into the Dungeon! A controversial idea bandied about for the London Dungeon’s Jack the Ripper show would take reality entertainment to new levels. Think ‘celebrity judge’ Billie Piper, star of ‘Secret Diary of a Call Girl’, think prostitutes on London’s streets, think auditions and you’ve got a ready-made formula or recipe for disaster – yes, that’s right, real-life prostitutes to become the imaginary ones in the show…what is it they say about all publicity being good publicity? The Art of Shopping Sometimes it looks as if Selfridges’ famous window displays are works of art and now they actually are. But, of course, the luxury department store’s latest display is nothing to do with publicity and everything to do with the art (spot the cynic). Charitably, they are giving this space, named the Wonder Windows, as a showcase for up-and-coming young artists who might otherwise not get such a prime exhibition spot. Muscling In It seems that an ‘alien species’ of mussels in the Thames are flexing their…er, shells and threatening native species. Apart from being surprised that anything can actually survive in the Thames, there has apparently been a zebra mussel invasion, according to the Marine Conservation Society, which is surprising as they come from south-east Russia. The greatest danger from the little blighters is to the depressed river mussel – no wonder they’re depressed! December 2008 23rd December January is on the Horizon 20th December Merry Christmas November 2008 26th November All The World's A Stage 20th November Surviving the Crunch October 2008 24th October Boris v Jingjing 17th October Soaps in Pole Position September 2008 23rd September Chips too Chavvy for Chelsea 16th September The London Restaurant Awards August 2008 26th August No Smoking, No Ducks, No Barbecues 20th August The Olympics July 2008 24th July Sandwiched Out 17th July The Show Ain't Over 'Til the Fat Lady's on Page 3 June 2008 26th June Love All at Wimbledon 16th June Miller Puts the Heat on Tennant May 2008 27th May Booze Banned on Buses 20th May Same Again? April 2008 23rd April By George 11th April Back to the 80s March 2008 28th March How do You Solve A Problem Like Medea? 20th March Flight Fantastic February 2008 20th February Dark, Satanic Turnmills 6th February A Diamond in the Drink January 2008 21st January People Wanted for Plinth 14th January Boo! Hiss! December 2007 28th December Tate That - A Hirst for Art 20th December Christmas Shopping November 2007 27th November Mind the Gap 26th November London On A Tray October 2007 26th October Leaving the Station 14th October The Sky's the Limit September 2007 26th September The Play Within A Play 19th September Fashion, Frocks and Celeb Shocks 12th September Saying Tanks for the Mammaries August 2007 24th August Heathrow under Siege 17th August Gormless 10th August Losing Face July 2007 24th July Are We Reaching Boiling Point Yet This Summer? 13th July Red Ken versus Blonde Boris June 2007 22nd June Last Orders at the Fag Machine 11th June London the Musical May 2007 21st May What Lurks Beneath 10th May The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of April 2007 27th April London’s Walk on the Wild Side 20th April Stand Behind the Yellow Line 13th April Like Water for Chocolate March 2007 23rd March So, Another Magazine 16th March Avoiding iContact February 2007 23rd February Sex and Art... 16th February C-Charge Protest Fails to Bring Down Government 9th February Live Earth London January 2007 26th January A Vote for Shilpa is a Vote for Britain 18th January Carriage on up the West End December 2006 29th December Food for Thought 22nd December A Poisonous Marketing Campaign 15th December In for a Penny, In for Five Pounds November 2006 17th November Big Department Stores Leave Santa Out in the Cold 10th November Failing to Save the World October 2006 27th October Frozen Prawns and Melting Icecaps 20th October Predatory Pelicans and Happy Woodland Folk 13th October Hope at last for east end of Oxford Street September 2006 16th September Lite the Blue Paper and Stand Well Back 9th September Of Poles and Twiglets August 2006 25th August Free Fares For the Fat and the Fashionable 11th August London Friendly 4th August Archway To Organic Heaven July 2006 21st July London - Celebrity Frat House 7th July Out of the Galleries into the Streets June 2006 23rd June Mayors, Nightmares and Marias 16th June Downright Rude in Paris and London 9th June Enter the Inferno May 2006 26th May Curvaceous Border 12th May Vegging Out April 2006 21st April The Camden Crawl 17th April Down the Pan 13th April I Want to Break Free 9th April Big Brother seems to have been left in a bar somewhere 7th April Don't Box Me In March 2006 24th March Political Correctness Reaches New Heights February 2006 24th February A Stadium's Tale: Cup Final Goes West 17th February Modern Musicals are Rubbish 10th February The City-Side Alliance January 2006 20th January February Sales 20th January Moby Sick 13th January Glass Half Full 3rd January Three Cheers for the Tube Station Workers December 2005 22nd December January Bites 16th December A Remarkable Year November 2005 25th November And a Partridge in a JCB 11th November Driving Miss Sadie 4th November Spam, Spam, Spammity-Spam, Shakespeare, Zorro, Chico and Rasputin October 2005 28th October Trick or Treat? 21st October We Don't Mind a Little Delay... 14th October Final Resting Place for Young British Artists September 2005 16th September Just a small urn for me, please barman 9th September D