MJ Gardner

Between the Time Magazine cover and Sam Altman's embarrassing Tonight Show appearance this week, I really feel like the hype cycle is at its end. 2025 was THE YEAR OF AI and we're gonna wake up in the hangover that is 2026 and everyone will start to ask "Yeah, but when will it actually, like, work?"

So they’ve made basically a reality-doctoring machine, that’s available to [waves hand around] EVERYONE and no one can see a problem with that? No one wants to legislate against the fact that ANYONE can now create ANYTHING on screen to do whatever they want?
No downsides to this at all. None #AI

Perpetually caught between my strong belief that as a marginalised artist I shouldn't always have to create visceral painful art I should be allowed to be soft and my unfortunate reality that I've had another great idea for some visceral painful art

dear theatre, do better

One of the many reasons AI can't produce good writing is it can't hate its own writing. It can't think to itself "Maybe I'm illiterate" during the writing process. And that's essential

Welcome to Britain, a country so short of dentists that an MP's 87-year-old mum pulled her teeth out with pliers. Also a country with thousands of foreign-qualified dentists who can’t work until they pass an exam so oversubscribed it’s like trying to book Glasto tickets. www.ft.com/content/f4e5...

theatre is not only the West End or off west end but is grassroots community work as well y'all - and that's where change happens...just saying

The number of global deaths of children under-5 is projected to increase this year (from 4.6m to 4.8m) for the first time this century. (FT)

The price of aid cuts.

Laptops in the Long Run: Evidence from the One Laptop per Child Program in Rural Peru Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...

One Laptop Per Child, 10 years later: "we find no significant effects on academic performance but some evidence of negative effects on grade progression... computer access significantly improved students’ computer skills but not their cognitive skills" www.nber.org/papers/w34495

So distressing these have been done away with. So glad I held onto mine. There’s an even earlier more iconic one I don’t have. Urgh. These shirts = originality - why don’t folk want this no more?

Me, with a Snes controller, a Switch and a PS5 controller on a background of a screen from the original Legend of Zelda!

Last night's videogame tour of The British Museum was such a stonking success... I'm going to run it again in January!

January 16th 6PM if you fancy hearing about some of the surprising and ancient history behind your favourite videogames. X

www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-videog...

School is wasted on children. Why do I, as an adult, have to pay So much money for classes? I want to sit in a classroom! Like 1-2x a week!

The USPS posting a NINE BILLION DOLLAR LOSS!!! sounds terrible. Certainly worse than if you said "USPS costs thirty dollars per person per year" even though that means the same thing and more accurately describes a government service

Poster with the text: Coming to Edinburgh's Capital Studio Spring 2026! Homo(sapien) by Conor O'Dwyer 13 & 14 February. A Brief History of Neurodivergence by Fiona Moon 27 & 28 March. Tickets at capitaltheatres.com. Top photo shows Conor O'Dwyer as Joey, with smudged eyeliner and a flowery mesh top, looking horrified and holding aloft a hurley stick decorated with painted flowers. Bottom photo shows Fiona Moon in a white t shirt, pink hair down over her shoulders, arms raised as she emerges from a green play tunnel.

Two of the EdFringe shows I directed are going to Capital Theatres in early 2026! If you didn't catch either of these brilliant writer/performers in August, now's your chance - they'd also make a great gift for your ND LGBTQ+ loved ones (and if you're following me I'm certain you have some)

It’s entirely unsurprising, but no less jarring, to have grown-up with it drilled into us how trial by jury differentiates Great Britain™ from barbarism, only to see it revoked with barely a shrug of the shoulders from the sensibles.

dear theatre, you were once

Funny how it's not "women being silenced" when women-led, inclusive organisations like Girl Guiding UK and the WI are strong-armed into excluding trans women.

Too much social change is happening because a handful of billionaires got on Twitter and couldn’t believe the plebs could talk back to them

Wes Streeting orders review of mental health diagnoses as benefit claims soar Health secretary has asked experts to investigate whether normal feelings have become ‘over-pathologised’

It’s almost as though we all went through a massive collective traumatic event about five years ago or something. I don’t know. I’m just spitballin’ here. 🤷‍♂️

God the over-diagnosis convo around ADHD is so exhausting, esp when it's framed as some do-gooder affair to save NHS resources.

I personally had more NHS time wasted on me pre-diagnosis when I was dealing with PTSD and burnout, both of which escalated because I couldn't understand what was 'wrong'.

What's happening in our arts institutions? 54% belonged to organisations that were targeted by lobbying groups either through private communications, picket or by talking to the media 54% experienced trustees objecting to or intervening in politically engaged programming 29% were formally reported to the Charity Commission, often after making public statements in support of Gaza

72% of respondents observed inconsistences in how free speech principles are applied with their organisations 55% reported being directly affected by Arts Council England's guidance on "matters of political debate" 56% were warned that expressing certain views - particularly support for Palestine - could jeopardise funding

New report from Queercircle on artistic freedom in a time of genocide and rising fascism: queercircle.org/lets-create-...

This will neither be here nor there really, but I'm going to start answering 'prefer not to say' for all gender and orientation questions from here on in. I'm sick of my gender being weaponised against trans people.

when theatre thinks its fixed its r*cism problem by taking a three hour anti-r*cism seminar three years ago

Libraries being framed as a waste of money is one of the most spectacularly self destructive developments of last decade or so. Libraries should be a refuge for everyone, instead they are seen as a drain on funds.

I just want a few things in life:
1. A Switch 2
2. World peace
3. A world where trans people and immigrants are treated as people not political punching bags
4. A polo shirt that actually fits
5. Studio Ghibli food

Are you a screenwriter, director or producer of a horror movie coming out in wide release in 2026? Get in touch with me about an article I’m writing. Tagging @patcasey.bsky.social @crobertcargill.bsky.social etc.

See National Theatre archives, i believe its free to visit.

The Salvation Army is not a charity. They are an evangelical church that uses donated money to actively oppress gay rights. They've been especially cruel to trans people.

It's that giving time of year again, so this is a reminder that no matter how they try to dress it up, the Salvation Army is not a charity.

Can you spare a minute to help this campaign? Allow transgender women and girls back into GirlGuiding UK

Allow transgender women and girls back into GirlGuiding UK

Transgender girls deserve a safe, nurturing space where they can learn, grow, and contribute to the community, just like anyone else.

Sign the petition... 👇

Good, Cheap, Fast - you can only have 2.
They chose Cheap and Fast.