Ian Greaves

God I hate Screenshot. Film people talking rubbish about television.

Could not click with it for years. VHS releases. UK Gold. The lot. Just left me cold. But I went for a cheap DVD box about 20 years ago and managed to tune into its camp register and finally enjoy it as a frequently brilliant show. The trick is to get past The Web, which isn't.

The dead hand of Virgin Media is ruining my life two years after we left. An astonishing reach of incompetence.

I raise you letterheads.

@greavesian.bsky.social This Birthday present from @stebenson.bsky.social came from left field! Walking plans for Saturday revised: Off to Summer Hill.

YouTube video by Ian Greaves Steve Albini on Mixing It (2002)

Digging through old drives this morning, I came across an edition of the much-missed Mixing It featuring an interview with Steve Albini. So I shoved it up on YouTube. youtu.be/mIux3N4adBk

Actual footage of navigating the BFI ticket queue 😀

YouTube video by Ian Greaves Graham Chapman on Midweek, 1986

James Whale interviewing Graham Chapman on Midweek in 1986. youtu.be/t_j5zo_NTpA

Penda’s Fen (12*) + ScreenTalk with Spencer Banks, Ian Greaves and Gareth Evans | Barbican David Rudkin’s mystical TV film on paganism, and a discussion with actor Spencer Banks and writer Ian Greaves, whose new book reveals how the masterpiece was made.

Barbican is selling well. Tickets are available here. Having it on the Cinema 1 screen will be a dream and blow your eardrums probs. www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/202...

Very informal screening of Penda's Fen + me at the University of Roehampton tomorrow (Tuesday) at 6pm. Obviously I want you all to go to the bells and whistles screening with Spencer Banks at the Barbican on September 6 but if you can't make that for whatever reason, then DM me about tomorrow. Ta.

Ha! My knees just went.

Penda's Fen: Scene by Scene Penda’s Fen, a film for television by David Rudkin, tells the story of a boy obsessed with the music of Elgar. Through a series of visitations —...

After my first viewing of #PendasFen in ages, spent much of the weekend with @greavesian.bsky.social’s
Scene by Scene on the film. Remarkable levels of writing and research. No stone unturned and another triumph from @tenacrefilms.bsky.social. tenacrefilms.bigcartel.com/product/pend...

Thank you Justin. And happy print day to you.

Big football energy, that.

Jane on the bonnet of a painted Buick. The photo is black & white.

The Kinks kompilation album, Sunny Afternoon, from Marble Arch records. The band stand up in a painted convertible Buick.

Jane Arden and The Kinks, both posing on or in the same Buick in Sixties London.

And it was generally speaking a Magazine knock-off at that.

A rare Screenplay/Arena co-production and directed by the great Leslie Megahey. A successor to Schalcken the Painter and Artists & Models. He quietly revised the opening sequence for its repeat.

Solo At Cafe OTO, by Shane Parish 6 track album

Released one month ago today, Solo at Cafe OTO. It’s Bandcamp Friday, so no better time to grab an LP before they are all gone.

shaneparish.bandcamp.com/album/solo-a...

YouTube video by Alex DarkElf The Fall - Bury Pts 1 + 3

A new way of recording, a chain around the neck. #Fallfriday

Penda's Fen: Scene by Scene Penda’s Fen, a film for television by David Rudkin, tells the story of a boy obsessed with the music of Elgar. Through a series of visitations —...

Lots more about it in my new book.

tenacrefilms.bigcartel.com/product/pend...

Houseparty (Southern)

He's confused it with The Coming of the Cross I think. The other King Penda play from a year later. They were like Popes back then.

The gorblimey line was in the original review. He was obviously pleased with that.

Purser (the only reason to read the book, Halliwell's contribution being mainly to copy out the notes he made when he was programme buyer for ITV) was similarly equivocal about Penda's Fen, but, interestingly, absolutely loved Children Playing.

YouTube video by Ian Greaves Byrd Hoffman School of Byrds - The Life and Times of Joseph Stalin (1973)

Robert Wilson has died. A few years ago I was asked to import and then digitise an extremely rare LP - only 50 copies in the world - by his early collective Byrd Hoffman School of Byrds. It is as on brand as you would hope: a show about Stalin. youtu.be/gCWbnWxm9Fs?...

An absolutely essential Orcutt release, and briefly back in stock in the UK at Juno. Don't sleep, as they say. www.juno.co.uk/products/bil...

The Winter’s Tale review – Bertie Carvel is chilling as the RSC ramps up the thrills Yaël Farber’s production manages the problem play’s awkward shift from dark to light well, but is often opaque in meaning

Aïcha Kossoko stole this. Otherwise an uneven night. Lazy susans and endless choreography are no substitute for a coherent line, but some scenes did sing. If I was a Guardian subeditor I'd have gone with the headline "Exit, Pursued Exceedingly Slowly By a Bear".

www.theguardian.com/stage/2025/j...

The BFI's Associated-Rediffusion season looks great. Several no-brainers here....

whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/defau...

A copy of Broken Archangel: The Tempestuous Lives of Roger Casement (2024) by Roland Philipps.

Am immersed again in Rudkin research down in sunny Stratford upon Avon this week. Roland Philipps has been a great companion over the past few days. Well considered account of a man who was one of the great humanitarians of the 20th century, and one forced to live several different lives

I can’t hear or read Tyrol without thinking of Mr TSW 1982 going on holiday to the Austrian Tyrol. Not the Italian Tyrol. The Austrian Tyrol. I thank you for this.

Yes good tempo on that. Any idea what the download stuff will be? Complete gigs? I think some of them proved hard to ID.