Latest news with #Confessional
Indian Express
04-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Why Magnus Carlsen said F1 is the ‘most boring sport imaginable': ‘You just drive around in circles'
There is a renewed interest in the sport of Formula 1 these days, particularly since there is a Brad Pitt-starrer Hollywood flick 'F1' out in theatres that's getting rave reviews. But the sport itself has copped some criticism, particularly from the likes of Magnus Carlsen, one of the greatest chess players in history. Recently, while talking during the press conference of Norway Chess in Stavanger, Carlsen had expressed some strong opinions about F1, calling it the 'most boring sport imaginable'. That had gotten some strong reactions from F1 faithful, who pointed out that Carlsen plays a sport that requires just hours and hours of two people sitting across a wooden board and sometimes the board position not changing for long durations. But why had Carlsen called F1 the 'most boring sport imaginable'. We explain: The hilarious part about Carlsen's rant was that he was not even asked about F1. Carlsen was actually answering a question about which player from the line up at Norway Chess would do better than him and Hikaru Nakamura in the Confessional Booth, which is an innovation used by the Norway Chess tournament where a player can walk into a small room, known as a Confessional Booth, in the middle of their game and give their opinion on their ongoing game without actually being asked by anyone. Players like Carlsen and Nakamura were frequent visitors at the Confessional Booth at Norway Chess 2024, a tradition which they continued this time too. So when asked which player he thought would do better than Nakamura and him in the confessional, Carlsen went on a little detour. 'I personally think Formula 1 is like the most boring sport imaginable. Like you just drive around in a circle for a long time. To be fair, the start is exhilarating for the pure power of the cars but after that, very little happens,' said Carlsen as other players seated next to him like Nakamura, world champion Gukesh, women's world champion Ju Wenjun, Arjun Erigaisi and Anna Muzychuk grinned. You can read our analysis of how Gukesh defeated Magnus Carlsen here. But Carlsen soon came to the point about why he was taking a shot at F1. 'It's quite long winded and most people don't really follow what's going on. People watch F1 — as Hikaru was alluding to — because of personalities and marketing. I think very few things in themselves, for most sports, there are other reasons why people get engaged (in the sport). In terms of personalities, Hikaru is a streamer and you know it comes very naturally to him personally. I get bored during games sometimes. That's why I go (to the Confessional Booth). But I think we shouldn't force anybody to (visit the Confessional). This is for voluntary entertainment. I think for some people it can help when all of a sudden as you start talking about certain things that you're calculating it might free up your mind. Or some people work that way that they need to sort of spell it out. But you know it's an additional tool, it's one of many chances that we as players have to showcase what we have.' It must also be explained what Nakamura had said earlier at the same press conference that Carlsen was referring to. Nakamura was replying to a question about how boring chess press conferences and interviews are for the players. READ MORE | Magnus Carlsen reacts to Gukesh defeat: 'Poor from me, got soundly punished… but all credit to Gukesh' There, while admitting that press conferences are very boring for players, Nakamura had said that he understood the need for having them. 'It's very rarely something that we want to do as a collective. But at the end of the day, it comes down to what does the future of chess look like, whether interviews and showcasing our personality can really push the sport in a direction where there are more sponsors and more general interest. If you look at India as a very specific example, definitely these interviews like today will be in the newspapers, they will generate interest as there are a lot of fans who love the game of chess. So that's definitely a big benefit. When you look at the US or England or some of these Western countries, I'm not so sure the interest is at that level yet. But if you want to move in a direction where you hope chess can become bigger, then I think interviews are a necessary part of it. So for me, I don't really mind.' READ MORE | Garry Kasparov explains why playing Gukesh is 'like playing a computer': Have to beat him 5 times… he has many lives in each game Then, Nakamura had elaborated further. 'What do we want to see? If you want chess to become bigger, you need more interest. The only way I think you can really do that is with personality. I mean to give a nice quote. I think fundamentally, for most people, chess is very boring. If you're not very serious about the game, you can't really follow it very closely. I know there are a lot of things in chess — like heart rate monitors — to try and make it more interesting. But for most people it's just a very boring game. So the only way I think you can get beyond that is to find a way to showcase personalities that make the fans want to cheer for some of the players. Especially in India you see it, when you have a Gukesh or Arjun Erigaisi or Praggnanandhaa playing in say a World Cup, these sorts of events the Indians flock to and they will watch it. So I think that's more about the personality and who the players are and the country they represent. So if you can get the general public or the fans from countries behind the players, then the sky is the limit in terms of potential.'
Winnipeg Free Press
11-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
No last stop in sight for Streetcar
Stanley, Blanche and, of course, Stella! Nearly 80 years since Marlon Brando, Jessica Tandy, Kim Hunter, Karl Malden and director Elia Kazan made A Streetcar Named Desire the stuff of theatre legend, the play that Tennessee Williams often said was the best work of his illustrious career refuses to slow down. 'I was reading in a book that before COVID, somewhere in the world, A Streetcar Named Desire was playing every hour,' says George Toles, who is directing the Pulitzer-winning drama for the independent theatre company the 28th Minute. Arthur MacKinnon photo From left: Kevin Ramberran, Heather Roberts, Justin Fry and Sophie George star in Tennessee Williams' most famous work. 'Kazan said that if it's cast properly, it always works, and that's because of its dramatic shape, its characterizations, its vitality, its humour.' When the play debuted in 1947, it disinterred deeply rooted taboos, paving the way for a stream of theatre — sweaty, lurid, streetwise and feverishly realistic about the politics of sex — that forever changed the form, adds Toles, a longtime film and theatre professor at the University of Manitoba who has directed Williams' Confessional (2018) and Suddenly, Last Summer (2014) for the 28th Minute. 'The emotional challenges it brings up have in no sense been resolved, tamed or domesticated,' the director says. Over the course of an hour-long roundtable, the director and his principal cast — Heather Roberts, Justin Fry, Sophie George and Kevin Ramberran — could hardly contain their enthusiasm for a piece of work Toles describes as having a 'primordial energy,' achieved by its mingling of poetry and realistic prose. In Williams' hands, the two were one in the same. Roberts, who takes on the indelible role of Blanche DuBois, says there's no character she's encountered in her career more intricately layered and challenging to reconstruct than the southern educator. 'I think Blanche is always the smartest person in the room. I feel she's constantly speaking butterfly language to caterpillar people,' says Roberts. It's a role that actors often dream of taking on — that is, until they're tasked with embodying DuBois' raw emotion on a nightly basis. In Truly, Madly, Stephen Galloway's book on Vivian Leigh's tumultuous marriage to Laurence Olivier, he quotes Leigh as saying that playing DuBois 'tipped me into madness,' Roberts has maintained her affection for DuBois. She says the character reveals Williams' intent to craft Streetcar as 'a plea for the understanding of delicate people.' 'I feel if there's a question in this play, it's how to stay soft in a hard world. How do you maintain the vision of beauty and wonder and not fall prey to those external, rocky influences?' Fry, who plays Stanley Kowalski, a role immortalized by Brando, extends Roberts' thought by considering the play as an exploration of methods of survival. 'Stanley is very much about practicality,' says Fry, who has long yearned to portray the brutish young man. 'Being able to survive in this world means needing to be focused on the right things, and poetry is not one of them.' 'As much as Blanche lives for the hope of it all, she does fail at practicality,' says Roberts. 'I would say that the same question of survival emerges for Stella,' says Toles, who believes the character's method of self-preservation is in self-censorship and selective invisibility amid the chaos around her. 'One of the most challenging parts for me in playing her is living in the quiet. Stella says, 'I just got used to being quiet because he never gave me a chance to talk.' That's difficult as an actor to play, especially from the start. So being able to find the emotions Stella is feeling, not just what she's saying. The most helpful thing for me is approaching her without any judgment.' The omnipresence of impending doom and the whims required to evade it suffuse the production, possibly because when he wrote Streetcar, Williams, who was 36, was under the impression that he was dying. 'Without that sense of fatigue and that idea of imminently approaching death, I doubt I could have created Blanche DuBois,' the writer, who wouldn't have a funeral until 1983, told Esquire's Rex Reed in 1971, on the occasion of the playwright's 60th birthday. 'Death haunts this play for sure,' agrees Toles. The 28th Minute mounts one production every year, with each performance serving as a showcase for its cast and crew, who prepare in a basement studio at the University of Manitoba. Under Toles' tutelage, each participant brings a studious approach to both character and craft, often remaining for hours after rehearsal finishes to fine-tune their performances. By producing carefully selected works by playwrights such as Annie Baker, Kenneth Lonergan and Will Eno, the company sets its actors up for career-altering roles. Weekly A weekly look at what's happening in Winnipeg's arts and entertainment scene. Fry made his Royal Manitoba Theatre Centre debut earlier this season in the backcourt dramedy King James, parlaying years of success in indie settings to a starting role for the province's largest company. For the actor, who is currently pursuing a master's degree in counselling psychology, the role of the intermittently stable Kowalski provides a professional opportunity for personal development. 'When you work with fictitious people written this well, what you have is really a study of human behaviour and understanding who we are,' Fry says. For Toles, who calls it his favourite play, Streetcar comes as close as any work of modern theatre to answering that eternal question. Ben WaldmanReporter Ben Waldman is a National Newspaper Award-nominated reporter on the Arts & Life desk at the Free Press. Born and raised in Winnipeg, Ben completed three internships with the Free Press while earning his degree at Ryerson University's (now Toronto Metropolitan University's) School of Journalism before joining the newsroom full-time in 2019. Read more about Ben. Every piece of reporting Ben produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. 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Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Confessional Festival to be held in Holy Trinity Church - how to get tickets
Blackburn's Confessional Festival is returning to its spiritual home for 2025 The music festival, which this year celebrates its 10th anniversary, will be held over two days at Holy Trinity Church in September. In recent years, the festival has been held at the Exchange in Blackburn which is now undergoing a multi-million pound facelift. Confessional offers an experience unlike any other with curated art installations, a buzzing bar and a true sense of community. Confessional at Holy Trinity ChurchPromoter Pete Eastwood who has been the driving force behind the festival for a decade, said: "I am delighted to be in a position to stage a 10th anniversary Confessional in our hometown, and original church. Thanks to the wonderful Arts Council England. "We would love for people to come together and help us celebrate, and join us on the dancefloor, for a wow factor weekend of live music, fabulous art, and supporting local creatives." Event manager Conor Synnott said: "Every year we push a little further, but this year's shaping up to be something really special. If you've never been before, this is the year to do it.' Rebecca Faulkner who handles artist liaison for Confessional added: "Ten years of laughter, music, madness, and magic. Confessional 2025 is our thank-you to Blackburn for believing in it." In returning to Holy Trinity, a redundant former parish church now under the control of the Churches Conservation Trust, the festival will be set amid stained glass windows glowing with light offering cathedral acoustics and leaving festivalgoers with a feeling that's as spiritual as it is electric. The line-up is currently under wraps but Confessional has a reputation for bringing rising stars and future headliners to Blackburn. Previous artists to have appeared at the festival have included Working Men's Club, Red Rum Club, Rianne Downey, Brooke Combe and Calva Louise. Confessional will be held on Friday, September 12 and Saturday, September 13. Tickets are available from 9am today (Friday, May 30) from and
