Blog

  • 07 Jul

    Improv in NYC and Horror on a Summer Afternoon

    Hello world.

    Quick update. Just returned from performing improv at the Del Close Marathon in New York. Fortunate enough to do two shows with one of my teams at Improv Comedy Copenhagen. A real honour, a real bucket list ticker and a real treat. Roll on next year!

    In other news, my latest column/piece/blog/thingy for The Copenhagen Post is live. It’s all about the terrifying experience I had hosting a cake auction at my son’s nursery summer party. Enjoy!

    As you were.

    xA

     

  • 12 Apr

    Death, Pride and Prejudice

    Hello world. Hope all is well in yours.

    The first part of 2018 has been a curious one for me. During the first week of January, my stepfather passed away the gloriously ripe old age of 91. He’d been battling Parkinson’s Disease for a long time, and my mother had also endured a great deal looking after him during his final years. It’s a grisly terminal illness and I was glad and thankful to see the end to both their suffering.

    The greatest trick death ever pulled is convincing you its all about you. Of course it’s not. Death doesn’t happen to you. Once you’re gone you’re gone – wherever that may be. Death happens to everyone else. The shock, the tears, the seemingly endless practicalities. The tedious minutae of planning. That’s the essence of death surely. Grief and logistics. Those left behind have to process so much. Even in this case when it’s expected and indeed welcome, death really is exhausting.

    So recent events ensured that start of my year was oddly timeless. At once fast yet slow. After an inevitable period of adjustment, I suddenly realised it was April. Running concurrently with family events, I’d taken a break from improv and stand up to take part in a theatrical adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. After last year’s Zoo Story, I was approached about playing Mr Bennet, the distant and sarcastic pater familias of the family at the heart of Jane Austen’s classic commentary of love, family and early 19th century social airs and graces.

    I readily accepted. I like being sarcastic and if I get to do it while wearing late Georgian fashion all the better. The production is being staged in Denmark by Copenhagen Theatre Circle and I’ve had the pleasure of working with some talented, lovely people. It’s rare in this game to meet people who are both talented AND lovely – they’ve always seemed to me hitherto mutually exclusive – and thanks to this vibrant cast, I have laughed and learned a lot along the way.

    Pride and Prejudice opens on April 18th and closes on 28th. It’s been an intense and intensive schedule during the build up and at times it’s been rather gruelling. I’ve been spoiled by improv I have to say. You just get up with nothing and create on the spot. I’m an impatient show off and I enjoy the instant gratification from winging it and discovering funny and extraordinary multiple characters in the moment. I find improv to be closer an experience to stand-up comedy than conventional theatre and I’d forgotten the more arduous aspects of the latter. Blocking, thrashing out character motivation, weeks of rehearsals and, of course, learning lines. Still, I was flattered to have been asked and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the process of finding the character, trying to bring a little piece of myself into such an iconic literary figure. I am proud to be involved and look forward to taking the stage next week.

    That said, we haven’t even started the run and already I’m exhausted. But being exhausted seems to be defining quality of 2018. Family has been front and centre both on and off stage. Seems fitting to reflect on how one feeds into the other. As I pretend to be an emotionally absent father who struggled with his duties towards his wife and daughters, I can’t help but reflect on the role my stepdad played in my life. He too was a complicated man, but a good man. He was no stranger to stepping back from the more dramatic aspects of those around him and often indulged in considered bursts of wry sarcasm. I suspect he and Mr Bennet would have got on rather well.

    Pride and Prejudice 
    18-28 April 2018
    Weekdays at 19:00
    Saturdays at 14:00 and 19:00
    Sunday at 14:00
    Buy tickets here

    Krudttønden
    Serridslevvej 2
    2100 København Ø

  • 10 Nov

    The Zoo Story

    Have you heard the one about two Brits in Copenhagen pretending they’re in New York?

    Very excited to report that I have recently been asked to take the stage for a theatrical production of Edward Albee’s classic 1958 play The Zoo Story at Huset in the heart of Copenhagen. Already home to a thriving English-speaking theatre company House of International Theatre (HIT), I was thrilled to be asked by my fellow ICC performer Charlier Waller to form the remaining 50 per cent of the cast.

    If you don’t know about it (and to my shame I include myself in this), it’s a one-act, two-person play that has often been labelled Theatre of the Absurd, but I don’t feel it is. It deals with universal themes including failure to communicate, isolation, class, societal failure and male identity.

    While being quintessentially American at its heart, the ideas that Albee played with in his writing knows no country or nationality. This also explains why we chose to perform in our native British accents and not pretend to be American. As two ex pats living in a different country, we felt some affinity with the ideas of being out of time and place, strangers in a strange land, somewhat disconnected from the status quo. Again, all these themes run throughout every aspect of Albee’s writing.

    It’s only a three-night run and a short play but it has proved quite an intense experience, not least because both Charlie and I are on stage for the entire play. Even in a longer play it’s rare for an actor to have 100 per cent stage time so in accumulative terms, it’s quite an undertaking. I should also mention that this is the first time I’ve been on stage for scripted performance since I was at school. So there’s that.

    Anyway, I’ve really enjoyed treading the boards, I hope this won’t be my last. Time will tell…

     

     

    By Adrian Mackinder News Performances
  • 18 Aug

    Sir Leslie Quint: revisiting an old friend

    A little over ten years ago, myself and writer/director Richard Sclater made a one-off show for Paramount Comedy Channel called Sir Leslie Quint: A Life in Film. Only this year, I finally got my hands on the episodes.

    The show was a tribute to our love for the bizarre, eccentric and sometimes deeply offensive British film directors such as Ken Russell, Michael Winner and John Boorman. All pushed the boundaries of cinema and all lived lives as large as the characters they put on screen.

    Named after my favourite character in one of my favourite films (I’ll leave you to work that out), Quint also represented those types of Englishmen who seem forever lost in time, forever out of touch and forever remaining positive in the face of monstrous adversity -usually of their own making.

    Our show also set out to lampoon the cultural trends of cinema and society through the decades of the 20th Century, as seen through the bemused eyes of one of its survivors.

    We wrote it by Richard interviewing me in character and improvised my responses to various questions about my life, work, films and controversies. This was then hammered out into a script.

    We had great fun filming this series, shot on location in London, such as Mayfair, Soho and Hampstead Heath. some of the shots we got in the Red light district we had to do on the sly, often met with disapproving glares from large men in doorways to sex clubs – who knew these gentlemen didn’t want their face captured on camera. But, thanks to bold and cunning moves by Jedd Thomas and Will Sinclair, we got more than we could have hoped.

    We wanted Quint to have lived and breathed key moments in history, much like Forrest Gump or Woody Allen’s Zelig, but on a much smaller budget. I’d also like to mention the superb work by Paramount’s in-house design team led by Chris Wainwright, who worked above and beyond to interweave Quint into documented archive imagery and also to create those absolutely brilliant movie posters, most of which I would happily hang on my wall.

    It’s the little details, I feel, that make this show come alive, encouraging pausing to study the frame for easter eggs and almost-hidden gags.

    Even after all this time, I feel that Quint still stands up. We were very proud of what we achieved with virtually no money, back before people could just shoot on a smart phone and edit on their laptop, and we’re still proud of it now. It’s dark, twisted and more than a little mischievous, but also warm, nostalgic and Quint himself is a strangely likeable monster.

    It’s perhaps ironic that watching this series again makes me nostalgic for a different time in TV land. We were given complete creative freedom on this little documentary. I suspect that would not be the case these days. Paramount actually went on to commission us to write a pilot episode for a full series. Sadly,  due to a change in management, this never saw the light of day. But I can assure you it’s a cracker.

    A year or so later, Paramount rebranded as Comedy Central, or ‘The Friends Channel’, with little interest in making original shows. So it goes. But I like to think that Leslie will one day return. You can’t keep someone like him down for long…

    You can watch the full series of Sir Leslie Quint: A Life in Film right here on YouTube.

     

     

  • 06 May

    New Column for The Copenhagen Post

    Hello world,

    Just a quick update. The Copenhagen Post, Denmark’s leading English-speaking newspaper has foolishly let me unload my brain in a new column.

    Read the first one here.

    I can’t take credit for the awesome pun on my name, and the child in the photo isn’t my son, but the rest is all me.

    Lastly, I’ve landed a new voice-over gig. I’ll reveal more very soon but without giving the game away, here’s a hint. LEGO.

    As you were.

     

     

     

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
  • 21 Feb

    2017: new website and making it up as I go…

    Hello world,

    Been a while but here’s a quick update.

    I’ve got a shiny new website. This is Adrian 2.0, people. This just got real.

    Big thanks to Rhiannon at Hey Kiddo for doing an amazing job.

    I’ve been living in Copenhagen for just under a year and a half now and it’s marvellous. Last year I reawakened my love for performing live and am now a regular player at Improv Comedy Copenhagen. I’ve learned much about the world of improv, specifically American longform improv, the school of making it up as you go along, pioneered by the late Del Close, whose notable students included so many of my early comedy inspirations, including Bill Murray, Dan AykroydHarold Ramis and John Candy to name, well, four.

    There are shows on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays and they are a blast. I take to the stage on Thursdays and Fridays, so if you’re in town, drop by – although it sells out regularly so I advise getting tickets beforehand. The link above tells you all you need to know about performances, tickets, times, classes and more.

    So that’s it for now. I’m going to try and better at updating this site. Yeah, I know. I said that last year. And the year before. Bear with me, I’m very tired.

    As you were,

    A

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
  • 02 Mar

    Acting again: Cuckoo

    Hello world. I’m in the latest series of cuckoo and here’s the offending episode. Only at the end, but I think you’ll agree it’s the best scene you’ll see of anything ever.

    Cuckoo Season 3 Episode 3: Mum’s Group

     

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
  • 11 Nov

    Writings

    Hello world.

    Been a long time and a lot has happened. Won’t go into it all here but I’ve been doing some writing that’s appeared in the world so I thought I’d mention these two articles.

    The first is on one of my favourite websites Den of Geek, about the most famous composer you’ve never heard of:

    http://www.denofgeek.com/tv/shuki-levy/37004/shuki-levy-the-soundtrack-to-a-generation

    The second is from The Guardian, a piece I wrote on my current life situation and the circumstances behind it:

    http://www.theguardian.com/money/2015/nov/11/priced-out-of-london-moved-to-denmark

     

     

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
  • 31 Dec

    Wheelman – a brand new comedy webseries

    Forget what you know about getaway driving. Wheelman has arrived…

    For more info on this exclusive web series, visit the Madcutta Films website.

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
  • 12 Aug

    Robin Williams RIP

    Hello world.

    Harold Ramis. Mel Smith. Rik Mayall. The voice of shaggy from Scooby Doo. Now Robin Williams. Seems someone is systematically killing off my childhood. Anyway, Even though I left Comedy Central over a year ago, they won’t leave me alone. They asked me to write something about the most recent performer to cross over beyond the veil, so I scribbled this while on a train. Forgive the odd grammatical inconsistencies, but I only had twenty minutes…

    ROBIN WILLIAMS RIP

    By Adrian Mackinder Uncategorized
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