PeoriaStory

Australia, the film: a mess

PEORIA -- The hot new film Australia is an endless, beautiful mess.

Be warned: it will make you furiously start mentally re-writing the plot to eliminate the cliches, to improve it. And as well wonder why anyone would send out such a chaotic film to the mass market.

Don't people who spend millions making a film like this have enough sense to hire a good plot writer?

The film is beautifully photographed and well acted. The scenery is lovely, even if it isn't totally authentic. But it's way too long, nearly three tedious hours, and so much could have been cut out that would have improved it.

Here's how I would have written it:

The English lady arrives in Australia only to learn that her husband has died. (Not murdered mysteriously, a cliche.) Cut the barfight (cliche), and have her met by a delegation of local officials and businessmen, one of whom offers to buy her ranch.

She stalls them and decides to visit the ranch to recover her husband's things. There the staff meets her and begs her not to sell because the authorities will take away the half-native boy, the adorable son of a maid.

The authorities soon arrive and try to find the boy. The mom dies trying to hide him in the water tower.

So here is the most interesting theme in the film -- the forced removal of half-native children to compounds where they will be trained to be servants, a horrible practice that continued in Australia until 1973.

(It reminds me of some of the practices of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services who take children away for weird reasons (like THREAT of harm) and stall against returning them. But unlike Australia, Illinois has not apologized for this practice which destroys families and children alike.)

Back to the film. The English lady is smitten by the boy and by the drover who has escorted her to the ranch, so she decides to keep the ranch for now and resist pressure to sell it. They decide to drive the cattle to town to sell them to the army. Cut the intrigue from the rival rancher, and most of the cattle drive. Cliches!

There can be some excitement on the cattle drive, but not the ridiculous action in the film.

They reach town with the cattle and sell them, but authorities seize the child and take him to the island-school. Show some of the conditions in that school. Is it cruel? Or not?

The English lady talks her drover/lover into going with her to the town's ball, raising the scorn of the others, and showing another form of discrimination in Australia that must be overcome.

Then the Japanese attack. The boy is rescued from the school and the three flee to the ranch (on horseback?), to sit out the war, raise horses, learn more about the natives because of the boy, and all ends happily. Or not.

With that plot it might be an award winner. Without it, save your time and money, or order it on Netflix and fast-forward through the dumb parts.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Schock whines for funds, already

JPDATE Dec. 21, 2008: Check out this helpful link to Open Secrets for information on Schock's finances.

PEORIA -- As usual, the Springfield State Journal-Register has the best political coverage on Peoria's newly elected Republican Congressman Aaron Schock.

Its crack political reporter Bernie Schoenburg reports that the 27-year-old newbie Schock has sent out an aggressive fund raising letter to area Republicans apparently based on his own and Cong. Ray LaHood's lists. LaHood (R-18th) is retiring at the end of this year, to be replaced by Schock.

Read the entire piece, and the letter, on the newspaper's site, linked to above.

It contains an attack on the press where Schock refuses to name names (shades of Joe McCarthy) and other amusing goodies.

The thin-skinned Schock apparently doesn't like press criticism.

Schoenburg's piece does contain one misrepresentation, which has been repeated endlessly by the press in Schock's favor:

Schock did say that he was referring to stories involving Schock’s being a notary. Callahan ran late ads in the campaign after it was reported that Schock’s father had testified in a trial that the younger Schock years earlier had notarized documents with false dates while helping his parents set up tax shelters. Neither Schock was accused of wrongdoing, and the elder Schock testified as the victim of an alleged scam.

There's another way to interpret Schock's dad's actions in this case: he was trying to cheat the US out of taxes, got caught, and ratted out the guys who set up the scam.

And Schock, in supplying false documents (a misdemeanor, with prosecution barred by the statute of limitations) also helped. So they were not ACCUSED of wrongdoing in court, but in the court of public opinion, plenty of people thought what Schock did was wrongdoing.

But not enough. Schock won the election anyway. Looks like he would shut up about it instead of raise it again by issuing such a letter. But no matter.

Will nukes to Taiwan be resurrected next? We'll see.

See other stories under the heading "Schock and the 18th District" for more on Schock.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Cartoonist event

PEORIA -- Cartoonist Julie Larson, who does the cartoon The Dinette Set will speak at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 3 at the Lakeview Branch of the Peoria Public Library.

Her cartoons appear in the Peoria Journal Star and elsewhere. She is publishing a 20th anniversary cartoon collection called The Penny Gang Down Memory Lane which will be available for sale and signing at the event.

The 80-page book with 20 years of the author's favorite cartoons sells for $20. A portion of the proceeds will go to the Friends of the Peoria Public Library.

The event is free and open to the public.

The Oresteia: brief impressions

PEORIA -- Bradley University's adaptation of The Oresteia has received an extensive review in the Journal Star and has been talked about among theater goers in Peoria. Here's my take:

It's worth seeing for the effort Bradley's theater department and multimedia program put into it, but it fails as a play.

The strongest element: the setting, costumes, puppets, multimedia screen and sound. In other words, the background to this production. While plays can be performed on a bare stage, they are usually enhanced by good sets, and can be ruined by badly done sets. Here the setting is brilliant.

The worst element: this play lacks the language of the theater. Whoever tried to translate it or update it for modern audiences did a weak job. The main characters descend to contemporary swear words, destroying the dignity of their roles, then talk in banalities that don't rise to the level of the horrific action of this play.

Theater (and to a lesser extent film) depends on language to carry its message, whether it deals with royal themes, as in this play, or bums. Think Shakespeare, Shaw, Albee. Without powerful language a play like this falls into overwrought acting to carry its message.

And that's what happened in this production. The actors are competent in some scenes but way over the top in others, screaming at each other. The result is a mess.

It's very hard to suspend disbelief when actors are screaming on stage, then a narrator or chorus figure starts calmly explaining what just happened to the clueless audience.

Then characters in the audience, more of the chorus, start their own cliched conflicts that supposedly mirror in contemporary terms the conflicts in the play over justice and revenge.

There's even a cell phone scene, where audience members are urged to call a phone number to receive a vital text message about the play. The instructions promise not to sell the phone number for advertising. Right. How is that enforced?

I kept my cell phone off. The jingling of cell phones was mildly amusing as was the reaction of one cast member in the audience complaining about the injustice of having to pay for the incoming text message. Injustice? Come on.

That scene was not needed and the cell phone experiment was a goofy failure and probably a cost that the play could have done without. We need fewer cell phones in the theater, not more, so why legitimize their use? Especially when some audience members don't have them, may have left them at home, or, like me, refuse to use them in these circumstances.

Program notes explain that since a modern college audience has no knowledge of the background of this 2500-year-old Greek tragedy, the exposition is necessary to make the play relevant.

Uh -- isn't this why students attend college, to learn about past theater, history and culture? Which incidentally didn't depend on cell phone scenes! A simple handout could have explained the background and raised a few questions about the play's central issues, so the actors could concentrate on the drama.

So -- the play runs through Nov. 23, 8 p.m. at the Meyer Jacobs Theater on the campus.

It's worth a look, but...

-- Elaine Hopkins

Fur free Friday

PEORIA -- If the thought of killing animals not for food but for vanity sickens you, there's a way to protest: Fur Free Friday.

The Peoria Area Voices for Animals will hold its annual anti-fur protest from 1 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 28, at Broms Furs and Fashions, 4620 N. University.

Signs will be provided or demonstrators can create their own.

Participants are asked not to park in Metro Center, though I can't imagine why. Afterwards those in the picket line might turn into customers of a store there, for gifts or a warm drink. Or maybe not!

This is part of a national event.

Fur coats sicken me. Makes me want to spray paint them, thought that's a violent act I would never perform. Fur-wearing is like dog fighting and bull fighting, all mega-disgusting exploitation of innocent animals killed for human amusement or vanity.

So sad that this continues in the 21st century.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Terrence McNally musical at WIU

MACOMB -- The 2002 Terrence McNally musical A Man of No Importance plays one more time, 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 20, at Western Illinois University in the Simpkins Hall Theater, hidden away on the third floor of the building.

It's WIU's version of an off-off-Broadway production, yet it is very well done with a six piece orchestra, a 15-member cast and a terrific play that only recently played at Lincoln Center.

Here's what Lincoln Center Theater stated about this play:

A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, was a new musical based on the touching 1994 film of the same name. For this new show, Ahrens and Flaherty reunited with their Ragtime collaborator Terrence McNally, who has received four Tony Awards for Ragtime, Kiss of the Spiderwoman, Love! Valour! Compassion! and Master Class. McNally made his LCT debut with this musical.

The idea for the show originated with McNally. "Where the next terrific musical will come from is always a mystery," wrote Peter Marks in 2002 in the New York Times. "But at a time when movie scripts are providing the blueprints for Broadway, what better place to browse than the video store? That, actually, is where Terrence McNally found A Man of No Importance."

"McNally came across the movie in a video store and the story of a closeted Dublin bus conductor involved with an amateur theatrical group appealed to him, so he called Flaherty and Ahrens," wrote Nelson Pressley in a Washington Post feature on the playwright. "They didn't see quite how McNally envisioned a musical out of it. Later, 'Terrence wrote some exploratory monologues,' Ahrens recalls, 'and we said, Oh. We get it."

Wikipedia states:

A Man of No Importance is a musical with music by Stephen Flaherty, lyrics by Lynn Ahrens and a book by Terrence McNally, based on the 1994 Albert Finney film, A Man of No Importance. It tells the story of an amateur theatre group in Dublin and their leader, who is determined to stage a version of Salome at his church, despite the objections of church authorities.

The musical ran from September 12, 2002 to December 29, 2002 in the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater at Lincoln Center in New York City, as part of the Lincoln Center Theater 2002-03 season. The production was directed by Joe Mantello and choreographed by Jonathan Butterell. It won the 2003 Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Off-Broadway Musical. The original cast included Roger Rees as Alfie Byrne, Jarlath Conroy as Father Kenny, Jessica Molaskey as Mrs. Patrick, Sean McCourt as Sully O'Hara, Luther Creek as Peter/Breton Beret, Faith Prince as Lily Byrne, Charles Keating as Carney/Oscar Wilde, and Steven Pasquale as Robbie Fay.

A cast album was recorded in 2002 and released in April 2003.

This certainly is a play I would see during a visit to New York City.

The WIU production is very strong, and was worth way more than the admission price: $2.

There are no reserved seats. The theater is small, so arrive early.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Rockettes rock, and more

PEORIA -- The most spectacular show that has ever played Peoria dazzled a Peoria Civic Center audience on opening night, Nov. 17, a pleasing, high-tech combination of ballet and Broadway.

The Radio City Christmas Spectacular starring the Rockettes is aptly named. It features the two dozen famous dancers, whose beauty, precision and skill are startling.

But in addition, this show includes a huge cast and live orchestra, as well as ice skating on a small rink, fireworks, live animals (four sheep, a camel and a donkey) skilled child performers, Santa Claus, remarkable lighting, snow-like confetti raining down on the audience, a bus that moves on stage, a video history of the Rockettes, and beautifully crafted costumes and sets against an amazing scenic backdrop or screen that also moves.

The fast paced show, in the arena, proceeds from one Christmas scene to another, for example from The Nutcracker to the streets of New York City, and lasts about 90 minutes without intermission.

But this production is fresh, without cliches that might have dulled the experience. The musical numbers are original arrangements of Christmas favorites, the costumes and scenes are also imaginatively conceived.

It has two more performances on Nov. 18, at 4 p.m. and 7:30 p.m., and is well worth seeing, a good experience for both children and adults. There's nothing sexy, racy or offensive, just original material, beautifully executed.

A veteran theater-goer and friend who has seen everything said it's the most elaborate show ever produced in Peoria.

-- Elaine Hopkins

COMMENT 11/22/08. Ed Dentino writes: I had not attended plays or music events for several years due to increasing hearing loss. I recalled having seen the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall in December 1965 when I stopped in transit from Peoria to Germany.

I decided that the visual entertainment would be pretty good. As you've written in your column, it is spectacular and entertaining. Great to see this program at any cost. -30-

Clean water and its price

PEORIA -- The city of Peoria may spend over $260 million to remedy its combined sewer overflow problem, which now allows pollution to enter the Illinois River.

Peoria Public Works Director Dave Barber and Greater Peoria Sanitary District executive director Stan Browning spoke to the League of Women Voters of Greater Peoria on Nov. 15 about plans to remedy the situation.

Peoria has 15 sewer overflows, where storm water can combine with sewage to flow into the river during heavy rains. That happens 28 days yearly or more, Barber said.

Testing has revealed high levels of dangerous bacteria in the river during these events, triggering a US Environmental Protection Agency requirement to stop the pollution, issued under the federal Clean Water Act.

A solution will require both engineering and legal expertise, Barber said, including a final consent decree with the federal agency. Teams of engineers, lawyers and consultants now are working on plans, he said.

"People don't grasp how dirty the (river) water is," he said. It contains animal waste and other contaminants as well as sewer overflows.

"The river is already impaired" from farm runoff and septic systems, he said, with the city's sewage adding to the pollution.

Storm water runoff also contributes to the problem, Barber said. "Street sweeping is a water quality program."

Peoria has 750,000 feet of combined sewers, Browning said. During dry weather the effluent runs directly into the treatment plant. Browning described the history of the treatment plant and its treatment processes.

Since 1930, when it was built, the plant has used methane from the treatment process to power boilers and engines, he said. "It's excellent boiler fuel," and supplies 75 percent of the plant's natural gas, in addition to the plant's $1 million annual electricity bill.

The latest concern is pharmaceutical drugs in sewage, Browning said, but the technology to treat that effluent is not perfected.

Barber outlined the options available to remedy the combined sewer overflows. These include building additional capacity for wet weather storage, adding bigger sewer lines and other system improvements. Large underground storage tanks could be constructed beneath construction sites such as the proposed buildings at Methodist Medical Center and the museum block.

"We continue to negotiate with the Illinois and US EPA," Barber said. These agencies must approve the city's plans, which have not been finalized. Construction could begin in 2011.

"You have to balance the cost and the risk" of triggering further regulatory requirements, he said. The cheapest alternatives, at around $105 million to $127 million, might trigger more requirements in the future.

"We want to do the least cost possible," he said. Whatever the cost, it will require a substantial increase in sewer bills to repay bonds.

"It might be worth delaying for new technology" or new revelations about pollution sources upstream that could be remedied, Barber said.

The project likely will generate new jobs, he said, but the city cannot afford to hire more workers.

Barber said he also has met with legislators in hopes that federal funds to stimulate the economy could be directed toward this project. He plans to continue these meetings.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Anti-Prop. 8 rally organized quickly on line

PEORIA -- About 50 people rallied on Saturday, Nov. 15 against the passage of anti-gay-marriage referendums, especially Proposition 8 in California, and the forces that backed the referendums such as the Mormon Church.

They joined the anti-war demonstrators who regularly meet at noon on Saturdays at the corner of Main and University.

Passing cars honked in sympathy as demonstrators held up hand made signs. The event was part of a hastily organized international demonstration in dozens of cities.

The anti-Prop 8 rally was organized overnight via the web, a new way to galvanize activists, the New York Times reported.

"Join the Impact, a Web site built the morning of Friday, Nov. 7, has rallied hundreds of thousands of people who are gathering this weekend in eight countries, 50 states and 300 cities," the Times said.

-- Elaine Hopkins

Shopping fatigue? Pleeease!

PEORIA -- I am sickened to read the commentary on how consumers who can afford to keep spending are now economizing, sending the retail economy into the ditch.

The latest is Michael Kinsley in the New York Times.

"There also is some concern that the great American shopping spree may be over. We have all the stuff we need," he writes.

Oh really? Let me introduce the arrogant MK to some of my friends:

Susan (name changed) a 25-year-old single mother of three children has a part time minimum wage job. Try feeding and diapering young children on her pay!

She gets food stamps. They're gone before the month is over. Her kids have Medicaid coverage, thanks to Democrats in the federal and state governments.

The dads of her children -- an estranged spouse and a boyfriend (there's no money to pay for a divorce!) young, strong, white working class men, also have part time jobs. They help with money when they can.

A generation or two ago they would have been working in American's factories, producing prosperity, earning a living wage, buying modest homes and autos.

They're not geniuses, probably not suited for college. There are millions of them out there, wasting their 20s, turning to drink and even drugs from despair they can't even name.

Susan needs everything. Start with the basics: a better car, a washing machine and dryer, a stove with a workable oven, more sheets, towels, blankets, winter clothing. She certainly doesn't have "all the stuff" she needs.

If she can't scrape together the rent she'll be homeless.

Then there's Sally (name changed), also single. She has a job, as a contract worker for a large corporation. So she's in business for herself, takes all the risks and usually works 12 hours daily or longer. No union is there to negotiate for her.

She has no health coverage and of course no pension. An accident, an illness and she'll be in the street.

She owns a mortgaged house which needs a roof and other repairs that her budget won't fund. Her battered pickup truck has 200,000 miles on it.

Her children are in college, surviving on student loans which will burden them for the rest of their lives. They're bright, and hope to escape the fate of their mom who has a 2-year community college diploma.

The US government has failed these people who cannot afford to become consumers and buy the "stuff" produced by the factories in the US and elsewhere, stuff they need to survive, not just to feed their vanity.

Their situations are not their fault. They stem from the economic structure of our nation, which has deteriorated badly since the days when our parents were working.

They need living wage jobs. They need adequate health coverage. They need guaranteed pensions, because even if they can save enough money for a 401(k), as we've all seen recently that can become worthless in a matter of weeks.

They need unions to negotiate for them with their employers.

Sen. Barack Obama was elected president on promises to do something about this mess.

Will the Michael Kinsley's of this nation, the arrogant columnists who are maxed out on consumer goods and never give a thought to anyone else, allow it, or just attack Obama and call for even more austerity?

How long will the middle classes, many of whom never actually encounter the poor, buy into that ideology?

The US appears to be at a turning point in its history -- save it or lose it.

News accounts everywhere report that people are buying guns, apparently afraid Obama will ban them.

Or maybe they're arming for the revolution!

I'm trying to rein in my cynicism and develop optimism about Obama's chances of turning things around for Susan, Sally and the millions who deserve to share in this nation's prosperity they have helped and will help to produce, if given half a chance.

We'll see.

-- Elaine Hopkins

On Nov. 15, Ollie Nanyes commented:

Here is one aspect of the problem: Barbara and I are not rich but we aren't poor. Prices have gone up faster than our wages, so we have cut back; we travel less and buy fewer inessential goods. There are millions like us.

WE aren't harmed by this, yet. But this means that business is down at the motels, hence they cut back on their staff. Fewer maids get work. The stores that we normally shop at get less business so they cut back. Restaurants see their business go down so they hire less staff.

Hence people like your friend end up getting hurt as there is less work available for her.

Hence some think that a middle class tax cut might put more money in the hands for us to spend.

I am not sure that I buy this; I think that Robert Reich is on the right track when he says that we need to rebuild infrastructure. That will put money into the economy (blue collar jobs that can't be outsourced); they'll spend more money thereby providing more opportunities for people like your friend.

So the crucial questions become (1) how much will the government have to spend to get the economy back on track? and (2) what sort of spending will have the biggest impact on jobs and incomes?

The answer to the first question is "a lot." Given the magnitude of the mess and the amount of underutilized capacity in the economy-- people who are or will soon be unemployed, those who are underemployed, factories shuttered, offices empty, trucks and containers idled -- government may have to spend $600 or $700 billion next year to reverse the downward cycle we're in.

The answer to the second question is mostly "infrastructure" -- repairing roads and bridges, levees and ports; investing in light rail, electrical grids, new sources of energy, more energy conservation. Even conservative economists like Harvard's Martin Feldstein are calling for government to stimulate the economy through infrastructure spending. Infrastructure projects like these pack a double-whammy: they create lots of jobs, and they make the economy work better in the future. (Important qualification: To do this correctly and avoid pork, the federal government will need to have a capital budget that lists infrastructure projects in order of priority of public need.)

Government should also spend on health care and child care. These expenditures are also double whammies: they, too, create lots of jobs, and they fulfill vital public needs.

Expect two sorts of arguments against this. The first will come from fiscal hawks who claim that the government is already spending way too much. Even without a new stimulus package, next year's budget deficit could run over a trillion dollars, given the amounts to be spent bailing out Wall Street and perhaps the auto industry, and providing extended unemployment insurance and other measures to help those in direct need. The hawks will argue that the nation can't afford giant deficits, especially when baby boomers are only a few years away from retiring and claiming Social Security and Medicare.

They're wrong. Government spending that puts people back to work and invests in the future productivity of the nation is exactly what the economy needs right now. Deficit numbers themselves have no significance. The pertinent issue is how much underutilized capacity exists in the economy. When there's lots of idle capacity, deficit spending is entirely appropriate, as John Maynard Keynes taught us. Moving the economy to fuller capacity will of itself shrink future deficits. -30-