ARTS ALIVE PGM 15 - 2004 TX: 4:04 Eastern Time 12 April 2004 THIS PROGRAM IS 55' 50" WITH A NATURAL BREAK AT 29' 50" Hi and welcome to Arts Alive, your weekly arts and culture current affairs radio...I'm VINCENT O'DONNELL and I'm JESS MYLES*This week, the ABC management starves debate on the CPSU report on ABC arts programming* A film-maker takes a leaf out of the printmaker's book* and culture and cuisine collide on the streets of Melbourne. Our guest is Te Puna O Whawetu, the Christchurch art gallery. I walked around this impressive new gallery with its director Tony Preston when visiting last December. And we'll also hear from Walter Laverre, formerly a circus ring master who has come out of retirement to play the ghostly grand father in Kage Physical Theatre's "The Day the World Turned Upside Down", a children's show that's full of circus acts and magic. And Nina Marie will review Starsky and Hutch. NEWS: (approx. 4.00) Ends approx. 5.20 Editorial. Last week we led the program with an interview with respected Sydney academic Professor Elizabeth Jacka. Professor Jacka had been commissioned by the CPSU, the Community and Public Sector Union to report on the ABC's performance in culture related programming. Her report, released on April 4th gave substance to what many believed was happening to cultural programming: It was in decline and had been so for ten years. The story was reported in the print media, especially in the Fairfax press and the Australian newspaper, but totally ignored by the ABC itself. Well, not quite ignored. Russell Balding, the ABC's general manager issued a statement describing as 'palpable nonsense for the CPSU funded report to assert that the "ABC is failing in its role as Australia's premier producer of cultural programming" ' We asked the ABC for an interview to balance Professor Jacka comments but were told that the two paragraphs from Mr Balding, with a further three paragraphs from Margaret Seares, chair of the ABC's Arts Development Advisory Group, was exactly 100% of all comment that the ABC was going to make. Since Prof. Jacka's scholarly report was released, ABC news, current affairs, arts and media related programs have studiously ignored its existence. Either at the direction of management or by the nervous self-censorship and failure of courage by broadcasters themselves, the ABC is trying to starve the debate about its own performance as the "premier producer of cultural programming". In doing so it's failing itself, it's failing its listeners and it's failing Australia's cultural development. We heard from Sydney-based film-maker, Mike Rubbo, about a year ago, when he was screening Much Ado about Something, his film about the authorship of Shakespeare's plays, from town to town, taking advantage of the quality digital video projection. Now, with the film about to screen on ABC TV, Mike is taking a leaf out of the printmaker's book and publishing a numbered and signed limited edition of Much Ado about Something, on DVD. Nicole Findlay spoke to Mike about the publication* Item 1: Mike Rubbo DVD edition (2.57) Starts with: Ends with: * Film-maker, Mike Rubbo, and Much Ado about Something screens on ABC TV on Sunday April 18th at 8.30pm. Food and culture are intimately related and groups from many national backgrounds came together to create a map of Melbourne out of food. Kate Stowell went along to Federation Square with a microphone in one hand and a fork in the other. Item 2: Eating Melbourne (5.03 music from 4.46) Starts with: Ends with: * Kate Stowell dished up that report. Now let's have some music from a show that opens this week at Chapel off Chapel in Melbourne. Here is Sean Weatherby, Amanda Armstrong and Paul Reichstein with the Pollution Song from Tom Foolery, a celebration of the wit and works of satirist Tom Lehrer. TRACK 1: Pollution Song (2.00) (ends) 16 min 50 sec Item 3A: Christchurch Arts Gallery, Tony Preston (9.34) First words: Last words: * Track 2: Forgotten Tribe by Coloured Stone END VOICE 26 min 30 sec END OF PART ONE 29 min 50 sec Item 3B: Christchurch Arts Gallery, Tony Preston (10.14) First words: Last words: * Track 3: Dancehall Girl by Salmonella Dub A former circus ringmaster, Walter Laverre, has come out of retirement to tread the boards in Kage Physical Theatre's new children's show, The Day the World turned Upside Down. The show takes full advantage of Walter's more than forty years as a circus performer and Vincent asked him whether he came form a circus family or ran away to join a circus* Item 4: Walter Laverre (7.12) First words: I don't come from* Last words: ... instant millionaire." Walter Laverre, and The Day the World turned Upside Down is on at the North Melbourne Town Hall. We'll find out any tour plans an post them on our web site at www.artsaliveradio.com. Now it's time for Nina Marie's review of the cinema remake of that 80s TV show Starsky and Hutch. Item 6: Film Review : Starts with: Ends with: ... 51 min 40 sec And that's the show for this week. The ARTS ALIVE team this week has been Nina-Marie Petrik, Vincent O'Donnell, Nicole Findlay, Kate Stowell Sean Kennedy, Anna Brain and Jess Myles. ARTS ALIVE is a production of the INDEPENDENT MEDIA FOUNDATION INC.. you can contact us by emailing artsalive@hotmail.com. We receive the financial support of the COMMUNITY BROADCASTING FOUNDATION ... the assistance of VICNET and the SCHOOL OF APPLIED COMMUNICATION at RMIT University. The program is available on the satellite service of the COMMUNITY BROADCASTING ASSOCIATION OF AUSTRALIA and on audiocassette and CD from THE ABORIGINAL PROGRAM EXCHANGE. Track 4: Returning by Belinda Moody Sextet END VOICE 52 min 28 sec PROGRAM ENDS 55 min 50 sec APRA Details: Opening Theme: "Same like B3" / d.i.g. / d.i.g. / CP / 5285392 / 20 sec. Sting 1: "Discone"/ Pinau / Pinau /OS/ 857 383 1942/ 10 secs Sting 2: "Ou!* Ou!"/ Teo Teo / Teo Teo / OS / FJC8 904 / 10 secs Track 1: "Pollution Song"/ Lehrer & Hurley/ Weatherby & Armstrong & Reichstein/ P/ Location recording/ 2 mins 30 secs Track 2 " Forgotten Tribe"/ Coloured Stone/ Buna Lawrie/ CP/ CAMMA253/ 3 mins 30 secs Track 3: "Dancehall Girl"/ Salmonella Dub/ Salmonella Dub/ OS/ 7243 5521 352 5/ 20 secs Track 4: "Returning"/ Belinda Moody/ Belinda Moody Sextet/ CP/ independent/ 3 mins 32 secs