I bought a few papers while travelling yesterday and kept reading about how Trevor Sergant was “honouring” his promise to the people that he would resign as leader of the Green Party rather than lead them into government with Fianna Fail.

There’s a big difference between resigning rather than leading your party into Government with Fianna Fail and resigning after merrily leading them into government with Fianna Fail, and yet nobody in the media seemed remotely concernd with the distinction.

I hate it when the media feed you a line that is obviously horseshit and expect you to accept it.

Are they worried about offending the souce of the line by challenging it? Are they just that stupid? Do they think we’re that stupid?

While all the attention seems to be going to The Joker these days, Batman must have been wondering what he’d have to do to remind people that he was The Dark Knight. The answer was a simple one. Have a picture taken.

Credit to AICN once again.

I seem to be drawn to photographers who have a knack for capturing human vulnerability. Remember the Charlie White post?

Susanne Middelberg certainly has the aforementioned knack. Her portraits in particular seem to effortlessly x-ray her subjects to their most vulnerable.

Some of the portraits are nudes, and nudity helps make people feel more vulnerable as subjects of course, but what I like about Susanne Middelberg’s work is that there is no attempt to make her subjects conform to traditional perceptions of beauty, she brings out the beauty of her subject in a very natural way.

The image at the top of this post is the one that first brought Susanne Middelberg to my attention - from a series where she uses superhero costumes to highlight the common humanity of what goes on behind the facades we portray to the outside world.

below are some of her more intimate portriats. Check out her site for more, I’d love to tell you more about her, but all the information I could find is in Dutch or something as she’s from the Netherlands!

I’m not a fan of reality TV. I try not to watch it if I can possibly avoid it because it makes me feel horribly depressed about the state of us.

Nonetheless, here is an RTE reality TV show that I thought about applying to for at least 2 seconds.

RTÉ Television and Sideline Productions in association with Red Pepper Productions (what a mouthful) will fly ten young actors to LA, put them in a house together, and give them 80 hours training with ‘world-renowned acting and audition coach’ Margie Haber who, it seems, coached Brad Pitt for his Thelma and Louise audition.

As part of their training, the ten chosen actors will receive over 80 hours of on-camera instruction at the Margie Haber Studio, intensive work in the Haber Phrase Technique, sessions with dialect coaches, advice from working actors in Hollywood, managers, agents and casting directors working in Hollywood. They will also get the chance to network at film screenings and theatre events, tapings of television shows and VIP studio tours and to shine at industry parties.

There is no mention of evictions, or of televoting or of cruel judgements from a panel of has-beens, however bear in mind that auditioning itself can be humiliating, and I can’t think of anything worse than having your audition technique scrutinised by anyone with a telly.

However, it has to be said that the training sounds pretty good - and hey, you get flown to LA!

All the details are here.

Thanks to MovieExtras.ie for the heads up.

Cork’s Midsummer Festival opens next Tuesday (the 19th) and there are a lot of good plays in it this year.

I went into their box office on Patrick’s Street - opposite HMV - and found that there was some confussion over the dates of They Never Froze Walt Disney. The play runs from Monday the 25th to Saturday the 30th at 1pm. The information in the programme is incorrect and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise! Trust me, they’ll try.

They Never Froze Walt Disney is a chilling tale of romance, remorse and refrigeration in rural Ireland, written by Jody O’Neill and directed by Jack Healy. It is a Theatre Makers Production.

Jody was kind enough to let me read an early draft of her play and trust me when I say that anyone who doesn’t go to see it will be missing out on a very good play. Jody is also co-staring with John McCarthy, and any play this good that gets two of Cork’s finest actors in it’s cast has to be essential viewing.

It is a lunchtime show at 1pm daily in the Unitarian Church, Princes Street. Go book now!

There are another few plays worth considering and, as always, the big draw is Corcadorca. They have mixed things up a bit by doing Voyzeck instead of their usual Shakespearean play, but if what I have heard is true it will be an amazing production. It runs from Wednesday 20th June - Sunday 1st July @ 10pm, except Monday 25th & Tuesday 26th, with previews: Monday 18th & Tuesday 19th June.

Meat is another one worth a look. Director Donal Gallagher has put a great cast together and without knowing much about the play itself I’m sure it will be one that will still be talked about for a few weeks after the festival finishes. Trust me I missed Gallagher’s Pondlife Angels and people are still talking about it today! Meat runs from Thursday 21st June - Saturday 30th June (no performance Sunday) @ 7.30pm Previews: Tuesday 19th & Wednesday 20th June @ 7.30pm. You can meet the writer, director, cast and creative team of MEAT on Friday 22nd June after the performance. Nice poster too, designed by our very own Frank.

Raymond Scannell’s Mimic is a play I hadn’t heard about until I went into the box office today. Scannell is writing and acting and if his previous outings in each are anything to go by this will be another play not to be missed. It runs from Thursday 21st - Saturday 23rd, Monday 25th @ 9pm and Sunday 24th @ 6.30pm.

While not listed with the Theatre on the festival site, I still think of the Threat of Humour as Theatre. Yes, that’s right, Hammergrin are bringing the Threat of Humour back to Cork, and having seen it on it’s last outing I would recommend everyone gets a ticket for this a.s.a.p. It runs from Thursday 28th - Saturday 30th June @ 9pm in the CAT club. You can also win tickets here!