With two Academy Awards under her belt, Australian-born actress Cate Blanchett has been granted a position within an international cultural elite. It’s been fascinating to watch the response of the Australian media, particularly News Corp, who dubbed her ‘Carbon Cate’ when she joined a 2011 advertising campaign encouraging Australians to understand the benefits of the […]
Three questions on the Arts Minister @artsculturegov: @burgewords #CreatingWaves
February 18, 2014
The federal Minister for the Arts has a standing invitation to participate in an interview for No Fibs’ Arts column #CreatingWaves. Contact was made with his office in January 2014, and I followed-up his staffer’s reply with full disclosure of my interview parameters. I am keen to ask him about his government’s approach to independent […]
The publish button killed the media: @burgewords comments
February 2, 2014
This week’s cancellation of the funding behind Australia’s flagship online news source The Global Mail sent shock waves through the local media, because many journalists were watching to see if the rise of the independent online media hub was a viable career lifeboat. It’s not all bad news for the staff at The Global Mail. […]
Touring with Vivien Leigh’s black dog: @burgewords meets Susie Lindeman
February 1, 2014
British actress Vivien Leigh (1913-1967) may have felt rather independent when she toured to Australia in 1961 with the Old Vic theatre company. Divorce from Sir Laurence (‘Larry’) Olivier the year before had seen her separated from the theatrical powerhouse she was one half of – the international stage and screen duo known as ‘The […]
Walking the Independent path with Janet Mays: @burgewords reports
January 15, 2014
The first political piece I ever wrote was also the first scoop I ever got. I was a resident of the Blue Mountains for thirty years, give or take my years at university and a six-year stint in the United Kingdom. By the time Blue Mountains City Councillor Janet Mays stood for the NSW State […]
Art might save Journalism before it drops off the scale: @burgewords comments
January 12, 2014
When Margo Kingston described the existential crisis of journalism, and that she wouldn’t advise anyone to enter the industry, she expressed what very few media punters were willing to say. Journalism dropped to the bottom of satisfying career lists during the last decade. In the 2013 ‘Jobs from Best to Worst’ survey, conducted for the […]
Breaking heartland in August: Osage County @burgewords review
January 4, 2014
Six decades ago, great American playwrights like Arthur Miller, Eugene O’Neill and Tennessee Williams only ever alluded to addiction, sexual diversity, mental health and suicide, or portrayed them in the hands of villains who always ‘got it’ at the end. These days, there’s a growing number of storytellers courageous enough to begin where their antecedents left-off, […]
O Come All Ye Forceful: @burgewords on protest Christmas carols
December 20, 2013
During the silly season, when you catch a strain of yuletide song at your local shopping centre, know that what you’re listening to (or doing your best to avoid) probably started its life as a protest song. Well, perhaps not technically a protest song, but a Protestant song, which once meant the same thing. When […]
Amanda Bishop, the UnReal Julia Gillard: @burgewords interview
December 13, 2013
As Julia Gillard made her way through parliamentary ranks before, during and after Kevin07, the political satirists of Sydney Theatre Company’s Wharf Revue recognised they’d need to find an actress to portray the woman who would become Australia’s first female Prime Minister. From her knockout live performances, to her starring and co-writing roles in the controversial […]
Boldly going nowhere: @burgewords on the inequality of Sci-Fi
November 30, 2013
“When I was nine years old Star Trek came on,” Whoopi Goldberg told Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek, at a casting session for the show’s reboot in the early 1990s, “I looked at it and I went screaming through the house: ‘Come here, mum, everybody, come quick, come quick, there’s a black lady […]
