Monthly Archives: April 2010

Blue is the new…Blue!

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Here we go again; DONOVAN. The unforgiving, cynical, potty mouthed agony uncle. How he knows so much about blue rinses is a mystery. Only one unfortunate biddy knows.

** Disclaimer: The views, colourful language and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Frostmagazine.com **

Dear DONOVAN

What ever happened to the Blue rinse?

Danny, Reading

The real question is why did it start in the first place?

Wikipedia says:

“A blue rinse is a dilute hair dye used to reduce the yellowed (or translucent, showing scalp colour) appearance of greying hair on older women.”

DONOVAN says:

It came about because some daft cow did it as a bet and her mates got jealous of the attention she was getting down at the bingo.

Or a group of G.i.l.f.s where playing truth or dare at an old peoples home high on Calpol!

It doesn’t matter if its Blue, Purple or Pink, you’re still aware that
she had gray hair down below!

Who wants to look like a Toad wearing a ball sack balaclava which has just freed its head from a candyfloss machine?!

I love how… the Blue rinse died out just Emo kids came on the scene!

These days every other 13yo girl has Blue or Pink hair, I think this may be something to do with the Daleks and their plan to take over the world buy brain washing us all to look like the cast of X men the last stand..

gotta love Emos….their parents obviously didn’t.

LONG LIVE BLUE HAIR!

Preview; Blackberry OS 6

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Blackberry makers Rim have released a video revealing their new Blackberry operating system “OS 6”. I’ve tried to gather as much information from the video as possible but I’ve had to mute it as too much “boom, boom, pow” could probably hypnotise you. If it doesn’t then they’ve recruited gyrating, guesturing and tie straightening dancers to finish the job. 

 
In case you were like me and got distracted; here is what I’ve gathered:
Features multi-touch for touchscreen but OS 6 will be available on both touchscreen and keypad phones. It looks to be more intuitive and has a customisable home-screen with different pages accessible by flicking in different directions.
Scrolling also features “Rubber-banding” which I presume means that when you accidently scroll a little bit too far it boings back. I could be wrong.
It also features pop up menus showing the functions that appear to be short-smart-shortcut menus with big icons.
 
The graphics are slicker and they appear to have integrated youtube into the OS.
Media Player gets a makeover and features an album “cover flow” style music organizer so you can flick through the album artwork and click on them to play.
 
The new inbox is basically the same old familiar inbox except with bigger icons to differentiate between email, twitter, facebook etc. messages and it also includes integrated RSS feeds. From what I can tell; emails now support image thumbnails.
 
The universal search looks quite handy searching contacts, calender, emails, Internet, social feeds etc all from one search bar on the home-screen.
There’s a new app for intergrating multiple social feeds to ensure you can never ever ever escape!!!
 
It also includes the Web-Kit based browser (better than the current one with widgets, fast panning and zooming and full HTML5 support and tabs)
 
It’s thought that it might be available from July but it’s not yet known whether current handset owners will be able to update their firmware to the new OS.

Stefan's Top Five's; Zombie Flicks

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Zombie Films (in no particular order)

Zombieland
A new release that after one viewing went straight into my top five, this romp through a zombie infested America is fun for the whole family.
The story centres around four survivors who remain nameless, preferring to take the name of places they have travelled from as their chosen monikers to keep from getting attached to each other (Columbus, Wichita, Little Rock and Tallahassee). Heavily armoured with comedy rather than scares Zombieland delivers a much needed rest bite from all the psychological horror and rubbish gore porn (Eli Roth, I’m looking at you) of late, and Woody Harrelson is one of the most bad-ass zombie killers ever. Even if you don’t dig on zombies I still recommend this film (if only for the brilliant cameo by Bi….actually, I’ll leave it till you see it)!

Dawn of the Dead
Ahhh George A Romero, the Granddaddy of the Undead, the Godfather of Zombiedon and one of the true masters of the genre.
It was very hard deciding which of his films to include, but I came to the conclusion of Dawn of the Dead, is it a zombie film? Is it a siege film? Is it a look into the consumer mindset of America? Is it all three and more? Whichever it is it remains one of the best. With more parodies/homage’s than there are zombies in the film, Dawn is the tale of two SWAT Team members and two News Broadcasters as they try to live out the zombie apocalypse inside a mall. With everything they could possible need under one roof they should be smiling, but there’s no time to smile when you’re constantly on the lookout for the re-animated beasties or fighting for survival against a nomadic band of bikers. One of the first and one of the best, this is a must for anyone looking to survive a zombie attack.

Night of the Living Dead (1990 remake)
The 1968 original of Night was a complete George A Romero affair, in the remake however he just re-wrote the screenplay and left the directing to Tom Savini, and Tom did a brilliant job. Starting off quite light hearted with two siblings squabbling about their dislike for the (now dead) mother, Night takes a swift dive into the realm of horror after they are attacked in a graveyard by two zombies, forcing the sister Barbara to take refuge in an old farmhouse with other survivors, with no knowledge of what is causing the carnage outside they are forced to overcome their distrust and help each other. One of the reasons I put this film in is for one scene that perfectly shows zombies, Barbara walks through a zombie infested field, instead of running she calmly walks, holding a pistol to the heads of each zombie she passes and eventually sobbingly begs an undead woman to leave her alone while pushing her away only for her to stumble back an try to take a bite. Possibly the only one of this list to go into my top 10 best films list (watch this space for that one) Night of the Living Dead is the perfect zombie film.

Brain Dead
I mentioned Gore Porn earlier in this article. I’m not a big fan of movies that contain gore for gores sake but before showing us the wonders of Middle Earth, peter Jackson gave us gore as it should be, with full ladle helpings of tongue in cheek humour. In essence, Brain Dead is a rather sweet tale of a young man trying to impress the girl he’s fallen desperately in love with, unfortunately his attempts to woo her are hampered by his over bearing mother who, after being bitten by a Sumatran Rat-Monkey and zombiefied, he has to keep locked in the basement along with all the other people her bite has transformed. Blood, guts, puss and limbs fly as Jackson uses excellent puppetry and even better dialogue (‘Your mother ate my dog’ ‘…not all of it’). After seeing Brain Dead you’ll never look at your lawn-mower the same way again.

28 Days Later
This was a tough movie to include, you see, there’s mindless people attacking the rest of us, but their not dead and their not eating flesh for sustenance. It’s the most annoying zombie film because it doesn’t have any zombies…just a hell of a lot of ‘Infected’ who have been contaminated with a Rage Virus, of course you can argue that actual cases of zombification haven’t included death and re-animation but that’s an entirely different world from movies so I’m ignoring it.
It’s absolutely safe to say that 28 Days is the scariest film in this list, from the eerie wide angle shots of an absolutely empty London (anyone who grew up here will understand) to the claustrophobic intensity of not being able to escape an ‘infected’ filled house until you can fill yourself with the same rage that has infected most of the country (deep much?), although there are some genuinely heart warming moments of burgeoning friendship and the heart breaking ending of a family unit. 28 Days Later is a film about friendship, loss and above all trust in a world where it’s every man, woman and child for themselves. And in fear of sounding to grown up at the end of this article let me remind you if you’ve seen it and warn you if you haven’t….thumbs + eyes = wince factor 11.

Hounded by the Insane {Ceri's Column}

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People shout at me. It’s OK; usually they’re nice. Sometimes they aren’t. Once in a blue moon, they’re just plain odd. I need to know why! It bugs me how some folk just have no command of their wits, decide it’s a good idea to shout at a stranger and then do not seem to think “hang on, I’m a fucking nutter!”

These are some things I have had shouted at me over the last year or so:

  • Oi! Chipper. (Not a clue what this means.)
  • Hey, Cube! (Uh…square? is that what you’re getting at?)
  • Get off the road you Twazack. (Twat + wazack – Twazack? Plus…I wasn’t on the road…)
  • Oi mate, where’s your fanny? (This was called out as I bit into a choc ice)
  • Blondie (!!!!)
  • Oi, you! Postman Pat! (I don’t wear a uniform, I am not a postman, I don’t drive a van, and I don’t have a black and white cat or wear glasses. What the FUCK?)
  • You look like a jute (vegetable fibre-string?)

What makes people shout random shit at strangers? I think we, (or social anthropologists…or at the very least some students) should conduct some kind of research into this…

Troubling. Very troubling.

Strike Back {TV Preview}

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Next Wednesday night at 9 o’clock, Sky1HD will show the first two episodes of its new drama series based on former SAS operative Chris Ryan’s bestselling novel Strike Back. Ryan is best known as being the only member of the famous Bravo Two Zero patrol in the first Gulf War to evade capture. After writing a book about his long journey by foot to Syria, thought to be the most difficult escape a British solider has ever made, he began a successful career as a novelist.

It’s the last of the three novels Sky bought the rights to adapt two years ago as part of a £10m commitment to home-grown drama, following Tim Roth’s starring role in David Almond’s Skellig and the excellent adaptation of Martina Cole’s The Take. The route of adapting popular fiction was taken by Sky after seeing the success of their versions of some of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld books, the latest of which, Going Postal, will be airing towards the end of May. The channel has also made other forays into producing drama, from being co-producers on the internationally acclaimed reimagining of Battlestar Galactica, to its little-known but fondly remembered witchcraft drama Hex, and for many years the long-running Premiership football soap Dream Team. But Strike Back is perhaps Sky’s most ambitious drama project yet.

Shot on 35mm film on location in South Africa, it’s clear that Sky are attempting to recreate the high-budget, high-octane action of its most popular American imports such as 24, which remains a big hit for the channel in it’s final season. The cinematic feel is noticed by star Richard Armitage, best known for his roles in Spooks and Robin Hood, who plays John Porter, a veteran of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

“It’s an ambitious project for television,” he says. “We’ve made three feature films on a TV budget and schedule. But the advantage of that is that these three feature films are linked together so you get a really interesting character arc through all episodes. American television is being brave and doing that at the moment, and this is stepping into that area.”

The first episode begins with events in 2003, with John Porter leading a Special Forces Unit, including Hugh Collinson (Andrew Lincoln, of This Life and Teachers), across the border into Basra. Their mission ends in disaster, something which haunts Porter for many years following his return home to Britain, when he quits the army. We then jump to 2010, and Collinson is now a senior intelligence officer. A journalist is kidnapped in Iraq, and the perpetrator has links to that fateful day in 2003. He calls Porter back into action and, keen to redeem himself, he agrees.

As Armitage mentioned, over the six-episode series three separate two-hour stories play out, first in Iraq, then in Zimbabwe, then finally in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The series will be shown over three weeks, two episodes at a time, adding to the movie-like feel. Chris Ryan was closely involved in the production, acting as series consultant and script advisor. He’s enjoying seeing his novel transferred to the screen.

Ryan says, “When you produce a novel it’s like a child and to see it put onto screen opens it up to a greater audience. I class myself as a storyteller now, and to tell that story on paper is a great privilege, then to see it on screen is even better.”

The cast also includes Ewen Bremner, Colin Salmon and Orla Brady. It’ll be interesting to follow the story of Collinson and Porter’s interlinking lives, but it’ll be just as interesting to see if Sky has finally been able to come up with an action drama series that can stand alongside the big hits from across the Atlantic.

Catch Chris Ryan’s Strike Back on Wednesday 5 May, 9pm on Sky1 and Sky1 HD.

Florence + Florence by Alexa Brown {Style}

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Mother and daughter team, Florence and Florence, are a particularly endearing set-up. In their front room in north London we have arranged ourselves amongst pots of tea and decorative cake stands to discuss their new business selling ‘re-loved’ vintage goods. The conversation pings about between them; sentences are shared and overlapped as they discuss the perils of living and working together, the unexpected benefits of the recession and their shared love of all things second-hand.

“Mum’s always done what we do with Florence and Florence, collecting beautiful things and mending them, and making things from re-loved material. We’ve had so many people comment on it in our house over the years. I think Mum thought it was something everybody did” says her daughter, Annie, 25. Since October last year when they came up with the idea the two women, Annie and Chris, 54, have been sourcing second-hand kitchen equipment, furniture, tea sets, picnic sets, old Penguin books, luggage trunks and much more, giving the old and battered items a lick of paint, new covers, or replacing their handles or loose stitching.

Annie explains their preference of the term ‘second-hand’ to ‘vintage’: “on eBay they’ll buy something from TK Maxx, sell it the next day and it’s ‘vintage’. It doesn’t mean anything. Some of our things are over 100 years old, some are newer, so we just wanted to say it is all second-hand.”

Although they reject the current vintage trend, their mission statement is to show the glamorous side of second-hand. Chris explains: “I was brought up with war-time parents who made everything. But I’m also a great believer in second-hand, so I’ve always bought second-hand clothes and second-hand furniture”. After sourcing the items from charity shops, markets and auctions they have set about making them beautiful again and ready to sell.

When they came up with the idea for Florence and Florence, Annie was training as a chartered surveyor (after a philosophy degree at UCL and an MSC in Real Estate Appraisal at Reading). Chris was running the administration for numerous companies including her husband’s, a collection of jobs she is continuing at present. Her career has been a varied one: “I gave up full time working in advertising when I had Will [her older son]. Then when Annie was five my husband and I set up our own business. So I was a full time Mum for seven years.”

Both women have always enjoyed sourcing beautiful second-hand things for their family home. There is a nostalgic quality to their products often harking from the 1940s and 50s. “I suppose the tea-time things are me with their Famous Five, back to the future feel, with sandwiches, cake – that’s harking back to my childhood” says Chris.

As a woman in her mid-fifties embarking on a new career, it is possible she draws a connection between herself and Florence and Florence’s products: “It’s the idea that these things have been loved and useful, like that slide box” she says, indicating an attractive wooden box full of small compartments. “Somebody’s had their treasured slide collection in it and it’s been discarded. Now we’ve put dividers in and made it lovely, and it will go on to be a jewellery box or something, somewhere else. I really like that idea, that things that have been loved or treasured are now going on to have another life.”

They both acknowledge the useful timing of the recession. “There’s definitely been a resurgence of interest in mending and making – I don’t really like the expression ‘make do and mend’ because making do implies compromise, being resigned to something less than perfect – but ‘make and mend’.”

Annie believes Florence and Florence can help younger people struggling in the recession who are unable to buy new products to furnish their homes. “A large part of our market will be people of my age, setting up their first home, post-university, finished with being a student who want a proper home with a proper look.”

The family business also includes Chris’s husband, Bill, who designed the logo and luggage tag-style labels. All three live together until Annie is able to move back out of the family home. The working dynamic seems very successful; the only awkward moment of the interview comes when they discuss the ups and downs of both living and working together. After copious amounts of praise Annie ventures her one dislike: “When we get home from sourcing and we’ve been out all day Mum will make me get out every single receipt, go through every product and have it all written down and catalogued immediately.” Chris defends herself but agrees: “The worst thing is this having to be the baddy and say “come on Annie, get the receipts out, I need to do this now” – having to nag at you to do the things which I know are important, but you don’t rate as high”.

It sounds pretty familiar to anyone who has tried to work in collaboration with a family member, and in general the division of labour seems to work comfortably between them. Chris runs the finances, the spreadsheets, and most of the sewing. Annie is in charge of developing the website, setting up the business processes, sales, and using social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter to spread the Florence And Florence word.

Chris proudly explains how the business benefits from their different skills: “I’m not a parent who has to pretend I know everything about everything all the time – it’s being able to learn things from a grown-up daughter, and be able to say you do that, you’re the expert there.”

The benefit seems to work both ways. As well as Chris’s uber organisation, “Annie has the most amazing ability to say “Mum just be happy, enjoy it”. When I was getting really stressed about fitting everything in for the launch, Annie said no, think of it as a challenge, it’s thrilling, it’ll all be fine – and it was fine!”

[www.florenceandflorence.com]


10 random things you pick up on set as an actor.

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Catherine and Genevieve on the weirdness of their careers….

howtobeasuccessful_actor_book_cover

I had the idea for this article when an old friend asked me what I had been up to. The answer was: lots of stuff that seems very weird if you’re not an actor. I called Genevieve and she agreed. We have to let people know how bloody weird our lives get. As an actor you always have those moments when you’re dressed like someone else, on a set that is made to look somewhere else, saying lines that a writer wrote. It is utterly surreal and you realise that this is my life. So, here is our top ten in no particular order…
1. Don’t drink the props…
I once watched an actress drink half a bottle of neat blackcurrant cordial as the production person in charge of getting grape juice couldn’t find any on time. Of course she felt incredibly sick. You never know what’s going to be in your glass or cup, it’s like drink roulette, it could be sparkling apple or it could be ginger beer. It might be cold coffee, or it just might not have sugar in it. It might be one take, or it might be twenty. It’s just not worth the risk.
[Genevieve]
2. How to pickpocket.
Filming can be boring. Incredibly so.  It was while sitting on a Pokerstar commercial ( a shoot that was actually fun. Mostly due to the amazing cast and crew. ) that I learned a rather old school trick that should help if the acting work ever dries up. How to pickpocket. Basically, you ‘bump’ into someone. Then you apologize. When you bump into them you swiftly grab their wallet  out of their pocket. They are so distracted that they don’t notice. Also they do not feel it as you hit them somewhere else. Genius!
Note: I take no responsibility for anyone actions or legal issues that come from trying this.
[Catherine]
3. How to dance like a drunken youth…
…In freezing subzero conditions, in a mini skirt in the dead of night no less. There I was literally contracting hypothermia on the set of The Imaginarium of Dr Parnassus, I was vaguely aware of the Director; Terry Gilliam; telling us to be more lively and act more drunkenly…in the same way I was vaguely aware of my toes. Before I knew it, I was being used in a drunken dance demonstration; being swung about by a be-hatted Terry who was doing a brilliant impression of a raucous drunkard.
[Genevieve]
4. How to stamp on the original Eighth Dr Who’s head without hurting him.
At the beginning of the year I was cast as a 17 year old thug. I complete stretch if you know me. I got a part in the up coming TV series ‘Luther.’ I had to stamp on Paul McGann’s head. Because Paul is such a big star I had to first meet up with the stunt coordinator so I didn’t actually smack him in the face. Or worse. Kill him.
So at a brewery in East London I met up with the stunt coordinator. Who promptly hits me in the face. It hurts. I get the irony but I laugh it off. So, on set – kep out of the way of the stunt coordinator’s elbows.
[Catherine]
5. No matter how good your work is, nothing is sacred.
I spent a good hour in a Holby City make-up chair while various injuries were applied to me. My unfortunate character; Shazia Khan; was supposed to have been in a car crash and as a result had a horrible head and leg injury. The leg injury was pretty spectacular and grossed everybody out. I get on set and was so disappointed when they decided to give me a blanket and the wound got covered up.
[Genevieve]
6. How not to embarrass yourself in front of Dustin Hoffman.
The title is actually a lie. I did not manage this, I have met Dustin Hoffman a few times now and he is quite lovely. On the set of Last Chance Harvey I saw Dustin waving and smiling. I smiled and waved back. Only to realise that he was waving at the person behind me….Mortified to this day. He was nice about it though.
[Catherine]
7. How to survive a zombie apocalypse…
In an apocalypse, the only thing you need is well trained zombies and a fight coordinator!! Especially when fighting zombie hoards with nothing but your bare fists and a toy banjo. In all seriousness, the last thing you want to do is damage yourself/other actors/a grade II listed building. Some inexperienced actors can get carried away and not realise that what they’re doing could be dangerous. So always listen to the person in charge.
[Genevieve]
8. How to motivate an actor to push you down the stairs.
On the set of ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ I not only decapitated a zombie ( lots of fun, done with special effects and precise spade movements ) I had to throw a zombie down the stairs. This is obviously not a real zombie. it’s a person and I don’t want to kill him. After two takes he is not feeling it. So, he says to me ‘If you hurt me I will buy you a drink.’ The next take the director gets his shot and the zombie comes up to me limping and says: ‘I owe you a drink.’ Oh well. All is fair in love and film-making.
[Catherine]
9. How to work with imaginary characters and scenery…
…in front of a green screen, when the other actors can’t be bothered to sit in as they assume they’re not in the shot, working with fictional monsters, people materialising a meter in front of you. You may or may not be provided with a tennis ball on a stick. You’ll look and feel ridiculous but remember…it’ll look amazing in the end.
[Genevieve]
10. Brian Moloko will show you how to put a drip in your hand.
At Three Mills Studio in East London, with make up that makes me look like a junkie, I met a childhood hero. Brian Moloko and he showed me the correct way to put a drip in my hand. Doubt I will use this skill but if a career in nursing ever beckons….
[Catherine]

For more on acting and how to be a successful actor, check out my book: How To Be a Successful Actor: Becoming an Actorpreneur.

The Inept Girl's Guide to Cooking. Catherine Balavage learns how to cook….

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I have been spoilt. This is, obviously, not a complaint. Just an observation. My entire life I have been surrounded by good cooks. Most of my childhood memories are of dinner time. My parents also loved to bake. I was raised on wholesome, delicious, home cooking.

As a child I could bake fairy cakes and sponge cakes. Do a mean lasagne or spag bol. I sat in the kitchen with my family and partook in the wonderful, bonding thing that is cooking.

However, in recent years this has all changed. I live a busy London life and I rarely cook from scratch. If I do I lack imagination. Always falling on the dishes I have been doing for years. I have now decided that this will not do. I will learn to cook. I will have a large variety of dishes at my disposal. I will be a domestic goddess. I will get someone to taste the food each week to give their opinion. This is the first article in my journey.

Sunday April 25th 2010.

I decide to start easy: spaghetti bolognese! I am good at this. I have been doing it for years. I don’t want my confidence knocked straight away. And I fail…. James brings the ingredients around and I have a heart attack because MY MAC WON’T WORK! How can I write a column without a computer? Luckily I know someone who knows someone who has amazing IT skills. I unpack the food and pour some wine. I switch my computer on and put it on the freezer and I watch, happy and amazed, as Ewan ( Currently my favourite person in the world ) remotely fixes my computer from Scotland. I even talk to Ewan through textedit.

While Ewan does his impressive fix up of my Mac I give some onions a chop. I pour some mince in a pot and, erm, James does the rest. I have fallen into my old habits. I do, however, have a good reason this time. I will not lie. I did some stirring and I drank some wine, and nothing else. I am aware this is not a good start….

An hour and a half later we have cooked and ate:

Starter: Insalate caprese. Buffalo Mozzarella, basil, tomato drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Main: Spaghetti bolognese.

Brown mince, chop onions and fry, boil some tomatoes and then peel. Put all ingredients in one pot. Optional, but you can add some buffalo mozzarella. Cook spaghetti and Put that in too. You have a very good and easy to make dish.

This is actually different from how I usually make it. Probably because I didn’t. I add tomatoes puree,tinned chopped tomatoes, onions, mushrooms and garlic. I brown the mince and then add the ingredients. I cook pasta separately.

Verdict: The food is amazing. You can never go wrong with Italian. I give it 10/10. The only Spaghetti bolognese I have tasted that I like more than the ones my parents make. Check back next week for my next column. Where I will actually cook.

The other good result? My Mac now works perfectly.