reflections -- reading finale by D.T. Max

Re: Vanya, yes there are motivic ideas that are threaded through it. Chris picked up most of those, so that gives me confidence that people will see that as a composition rather than an improvisation in the future.

But yes, my own approach to music is much more improvisational than Steve Sondheim. To be fair, if he'd grown up with Sibelius, then that's much closer to the analogy.

It's like: I had a mostly very up-and-down strict classical training, but because it was reliant on Sibelius for composition, I'm just glad that the DAW stuff has gotten to a level that's almost real.

I had jazz training too, of course, but that wasn't what I was told to pursue, so it's always been my hobby.

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This is odd, but fun. To be fair, if Mr. Sondheim wanted to talk to me one-on-one before he died, there's plenty of ways that he could have made that happen.

Until I made Portrait, my guess was that he thought that I was talented, but was that something that translated to musicals?

After that, that's when it became another debate, as in 'how was this so effective?'

I'd like to think that he enjoyed watching those old movies that I was watching in 2021, and I'll see if I can dig up some of my notes about rhyme... hence the other post.

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I refuse to budge on those Tina scripts.

The negotiation soured me on the whole idea. That's totally valid.

I'm also rather pissed off at my weed-smoking and psychedelic-taking compatriots and their lack of moral courage. When the time came to stand up and say 'we do drugs', where the fuck were all of you? That's my answer: I'm not sympathetic to you because we're fellow stoners; I'm angry because I didn't see any of you picketing for change.

As I say, if they think that idea is exactly what Aotearoa needs, then nothing is stopping them from buying my drafts, or even my whole book, and then adapting it to their purposes without me.

That's a legit offer. That's something that any real professional could make, and that's why I implore them to accept.

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I'm not what Aotearoa needs; of course, I do think that my POV and music are, but that's arrogant and conceited from someone who became so desperate to change things that I attend Question Time to tick off politicians.

I believe the 2030 story is what we need, and I also think that people who are apprehensive because of the occupation are morons. That's not even the largest riot that NZ has ever had. My message is that people should prepare for more riots and civil unrest. That's very likely where we're heading. -

They just don't like the ambiguity; ie that I'm willing to say 'he's my friend, even though I don't believe his conspiracy bullshit' -- to most NZ creatives, that's not possible, and that's one of the problems with our industry (and our culture more generally... watch Chloe for more). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL34QRnorI4&list=PLdPWURKgx3sZWsJfaPmpptGR62oOxrrrn&index=151&ab_channel=TheDepartmentofInformation Manny's brilliant as a writer, and I'm totally fine to accept his eccentricities as part of that package. That's how people used to think before social media, and I'm guessing that I share that old-school viewpoint because the only reason I even have Facebook is because I took an acting paper in my first year of uni, and that required me to have a page. After that, it's been all business. Even the rants are business. That page sat dormant for something like 6 or 7 years before Riddell Productions geared up for our first release. If I used Facebook for socialising, then I'd have a social life. That's not why I use it, and those of you who think I'm magically going to 'heal' should stop reading me. -

This is what I haven't yet managed to fully explain to the outsiders that read me: they aren't getting how that PM being like your neighbour thing is more of an Australia vibe, whereas our SIS is really protective. It's easier to feel like a neighbour when there's 20+ million people and regional governance. That's a construction of Aussie media, which is ten times more powerful and influential than our local counterparts. To us, MPs are like our neighbours, but our PM is increasingly presidential. Helen and Jacinda are the two who really pushed that trend forward imo.

This is a former communist country in everything but name. So, yeah, that's the level of spying that I've put up with for a long, long time now.

Even knowing that I've won friends among the journos and politicians doesn't change the nature of 24/7 surveillance.

That's roughly 3 years, then I had 18 months of slightly lesser surveillance in that 2018-2020 period.

Suffice to say, that's where this attitude is coming from, and that's also why it strikes a chord with Māori: I'm facing down this bullshit for being an anti-war, pro-drugs hippie, which says that the War on Drugs is alive and well here. - Nothing can make that feel ok. Nothing can fix that. So stop pretending like a 'fresh start' where the same Wellingtonians that hated me get to laugh at me again is a good idea. I hate being spied on. I'm just rude enough to tell people that it's happening.

That's it: I don't want healing, and I highly doubt they'd make me a person. If I thought that I could collaborate meaningfully with my peer group, then I would have. That's not a slam on anyone. It's just that I don't share your worldview, and that it has become very obvious that you do not share mine. I believe in that 2030 script with every fibre of my being, while I wrote those other ones mostly because I was bored and trying to avoid jobsearching during a WINZ course.

No, they'd make me into their butt monkey. That's my fear, and I have damn good reasons for believing that people mostly exist to exploit me, manipulate me or call me a sick freak. Ask my brother to do his tight five on Jerry from Parks and Rec and the fat dudes from Brooklyn Nine-Nine if you think that those shows only peddle 'nice' humour. That's his point: that those fat, old dudes are the butt monkeys that allow those characters to make mean jokes that most of the audience doesn't perceive as mean. That's how I feel about M'Lady: a bunch of women mocking men, but then failing to nail the love song that I nailed in Portrait of a Knight. That's why I said no to their 'therapy' It's not my music that's special. It's the music and words fitting together well: that's the rarity, and those are my words (or Emanuel's). Stop dreaming of how you could improve my songs and start accepting that you haven't written them and I'm not persuadable. - I'm functioning fine, if only you cunts would fuck off and stop annoying me. I'm sorry you felt hurt by my portrayal of you in scripts and in social media, but have you honestly given me a reason to see you any other way? That's my answer. Novelists get this shit constantly, so I'm sure that those fat, old dudes are reading along and getting my point. I'm not stealing moments from you: most of you are people that I only have a nodding acquaintance with, and believe me that I'm way less obsessed with you than you are with me. I mean, here I am dealing with this titanic legacy that I prefer not to talk about because it's too fucking weird: like, all my peers are suddenly treating me with respect because they heard that tape from Sondheim, but they weren't treating me that way before. Yes, I'm a scholar; I played a Bock tune recently, I've messed around with most of that catalogue of songs, but I know Sondheim's music about as well as most of you know Sciarrino or Grisey or whoever else it is that you idolised. - I think this whole 'stolen lives' criticism suggests that all our emotional lives are quite similar, and it's really a matter of disagreeing with the manner of expression of those emotional lives. I hate it when theatre kids think their way of feeling is more authentic: no, it's not. That's a buttload of theory and technique that you all worked your arses off to memorise, just like my classical training was. Then you wonder why it is that I'm able to use those harmonies and vocal techniques... The same goes for my rock songs. Laugh at me if you want, but I do think that my new musical captures a truly authentic NZ rock sound, and that's different to That Bloody Woman, which was a Broadway rock sound. And how did I do it? By not being afraid to cover those songs and sound foolish. I figured that only fans were listening to my demos, but I'm getting the sense that many of my enemies were too, and I'm simply annoyed at them. Fuck off, NZSM, fuck off Welly theatre community: this is why I moved to Johnsonville. -

I wouldn't have needed to front like this if people treated me like a normal human being, despite saying that my very normalness is what makes me compelling. That's not selling me. Real conversations, real discussions where I'm allowed to say no are absolutely necessary. That's my answer: no. That's giving me agency, that's allowing me to make decisions about my life and not about whether I should do penance for being rude. That's not happening.

I barely trust Barbara, and I don't trust anyone else involved with opera or musicals at all. I like Cadence's work, but it's her choice not to follow up and meet me. -

I'm never going to agree: no tina, no feel-good, no series. Never.

Only me saying no.

Nothing can persuade me, and the main reason is because you've all been stalking me without writing me an email, sending me a friend request, or in any way shape or form appearing as anything other than critics that are angry at me for making them feel bad about themselves.

I don't think my purpose in life is to be the portrait of the artist as a young man. That's a great book, and one of the few Joyce things I took a stab at reading, but it doesn't mean that I should. Lin did, and he was mediocre; his shows survived despite his performances, not because of his performances.

That's my belief, and I totally think that the Dak film works in spite of me and Chloe, who are hardly the most likeable people in that film. I'm doing the 2030 story, and that's actually my decision to make. Respect me by respecting my decision to publish a book rather than making a TV series, while fully acknowledging that those stories are timeless, and you can simply wait for me to publish and then buy the rights as if I were Owen Marshall or Witi Ihimaera or Alan Duff. - I'm not publishing via VUW either; those doors are permanently closed until I get some much better answers about the Town Hall and how it is that the NZSM is able to raise nearly $30 million for a building from private donors while the school itself is about to be closed down by the university? That's yet another instance of the 1% proving how desperately they want to hold on to those cultural signifiers that demarcate their existence. I doubt all of those donors are active concert-goers, but they subscribe to the ideology of life that classical concerts market to people, which is inherently elitist, inherently exclusionary, and dwindling. It's easy to take potshots when the system chewed me up and spat me out, until I got famous for doing something that they consider declasse. - I can edit my book myself and self-publish it with a limited run. That's what Manny did for Olympia, I think, though some of his other books have been published by NZ publishers. The way I see it, this thing isn't going to sell more than a few hundred copies, so I'll put it together (ideally with help), then print 100 copies and see how that goes. Tom published a book on Pike River inexpensively, so I might ask him how he did that. - NB: this is me when I'm not stoned. I also disagree that one can't edit while high... I often do, and have done so professionally. Though there's nothing conventional about my editing process, as demonstrated by my decision to spend my time while stoned editing that recent story! Brahms 2 is a great piano concerto. I think that one of Jonathan Tunick's proteges orchestrated the A major intermezzo, which is a favourite of mine. - Overall, it's only interesting for people that were expecting him to change his story when he was older and near death. Lapine said about him that 'Steve's got his story and he's sticking to it' regarding that Six by Sondheim documentary.