metro Arts & Entertainment Victor And Gord CUBED In Town Tonight Art imitates life in this winsome four- person comedy about, and starring, two real life childhood friends and an equally authentic brother and sister. Tears, laughter, cigarettes and kisses are shared over the years, under the direction of Una McKevitt Tonight until Sat, Project Arts Centre, 39 Essex Street East D2, 6.30pm (Sat mat 1pm), 12 to 15. Tel: 1850 374 643. www.fringefest.com Three women perform a triptych of stories that unlock the secrets of a mute man who talks though playing his piano. A multimedia, site-specific performance apparently inspired by true events Until Sep 15, meet inside the CHQ building, IFSC, Georges Dock D1, 5.45pm, 10 to 12. Tel: 1850 374 643. www.fringefest.com A Moment Of Suitable Silence Stuart Goldsmith The fine London jokesmith headlines this Bulmers Comedy showcase that also stars Aussie everyman Marcus Ryan, the ubiquitous Eleanor Tiernan and Steve Cummin, who can disarm a heckle at 20 paces Tonight until Sat, The Laughter Lounge, Eden Quay D1, 7pm, 25. Tel: 0818 719 30. www.bulmerscomedy.ie lifeArts & Entertainment The Big Interview Nick Hornby Naked truth about heres no coffee to drink in Nick Hornbys north London office: instead he offers me a glass of water. I only drink this stuff, he says apologetically, holding a plastic vat of Starbucks from which he drinks compulsively while sucking up endless cigarettes. A short, bald, round man of habit with addictive tendencies: Hornby could be a character from one of his novels, which to some extent he is. Some writers create a mystery about themselves because of certain decisions they make early in their careers, he says deadpan. Whereas I dont hide any details about myself at all. Everyone knows Nick Hornby: he single-handedly turned football from working-class hobby into middle-class obsession with his 1992 football memoir Fever Pitch; then invented lad-lit with a string of novels about the difficulty of being a bloke. In fact, its more complicated than that, but only a bit. Rupert Murdoch and Hillsborough had something to do with the gentrification of football, he points out dryly. Plus I write about women too. Which indeed he does: there was a suicidal one in his last novel A Long Way Down, and an annoyed narrator one in How To Be Good. And theres a key female character in his new novel Juliet, Naked: Annie, girlfriend of weird music nut Duncan, stuck in a dead-end job in a gloomy seaside town. Still, its the male characters you remember Hornby for: misunderstood, self-deprecating, slightly sad men who want to do the right thing but cant quite pull it off. Juliet, Naked returns to the High Fidelity-esque, neurotic emotional landscape of the male fanatic so familiar to Hornby readers, but here it gets a harder time, partly because Hornby richly exploits the comic potential of T the Internet chat room (Duncan, a frustrated wannabe academic runs a website devoted to the music of American recluse Tucker Crowe, who disappeared after making his anguished masterpiece, Juliet). I do have fun with Duncan, Hornby admits. I always knew he was going to be inadequate. Im fascinated by how the Internet offers people so much music and yet they still get fixated by certain bands as much as they ever did. But I also want to have jokes and you cant make jokes about happy, successful people who know what they are about. Failure is a very English subject, but its also funny. That mix of comedy and melancholy feels like a natural extension of self. Hornby has never disguised the fact his worldview tends to the downbeat. He started going to therapy in his twenties (which he credits with making him realise his experience as an Arsenal fan was legitimate material for a book). The tricky question of how to be a good parent is a recurring theme (Hornby has three sons; his eldest, Danny is autistic). H e struggles with the notion that he should visibly delight in his success. Im prouder of my film work [hes adapted Lynn Barbers memoir An Education, released this autumn] than I am my novels, he says uncomfortably. Why? Because, it feels immodest, he stutters. A film is a collaboration. I like seeing my books and thinking: Yeah, theyre mounting up nicely. But its not like theyre a work of genius or anything. Hornbys critics would agree his novels occupy a safe, non-aspirational middle I want to have jokes and you cant make jokes about happy, successful people who know what they are about The progenitor of lad-lit tells Claire Allfree about his new novel, Juliet, Naked, which explores the male psyche through the prism of the Internet age EXHIBITION CSI: The Experience Booking Soon Florence And The Machine Hotly tipped at this weeks Mercury Awards but surprisingly pipped to the post by Speech Debelle, Florence And The Machine are unlikely to be sulking. Its been a good year for the quintet, from bagging the Critics Choice Award at the BRITs to more recently wowing audiences at both Oxegen and Electric Picnic. The future seems bright, then, for flame-haired Flo, who on debut album Lungs, managed to channel every female rock chick that ever lived while still forging her own sound orchestral feral romances delivered with thrilling conviction. Expect tickets for this Dublin date on sale tomorrow to sell out quicker than you can say Tim-Burton-and-Kate- Bushs-lovechild Dec 7, Olympia Theatre, 72 Dame Street D2, 7.30pm, 24.50. Tel: 0818 719 300. www.florenceandthemachine.net 12 metrolife Thursday, September 10, 2009 We are being detoured into the land of make- believe, deadpanned one Horatio Caine, probably while fondling his trademark sunglasses. These words rang in my ears as I approached the Ambassador Theatre now cordoned off not with police tape but Garda tape, naturally. A flashing blue light crowned an undercover cop car for added we- have-an-incident emphasis welcome to CSI: The Experience. A spin-off of the hugely popular TV franchise, this interactive touring exhibition drew 1.5 million visitors in the US during its opening year, and has Dublins wannabe sleuths in its sights for its final few weeks. I arrived heavily armed with a few crime fiction fans in tow one, a Horatio devotee and the other? Well, she loves nothing more than to curl up with a nice Saw film. After a pre-recorded briefing from Gil Grisson (actor William Peterson), we were equipped with a report sheet and assigned one of three crime scenes: a car smashed into a house, with a body at the wheel. I doodled my evidence on the diagram badly, my Torture Pornster partner mistaking my beer bottle for a condom, which wouldve taken the investigation into a different direction altogether before moving through a succession of badly- signposted labs (the domain of David Hodges, played by Wallace Langham, pictured) to test DNA, toxicology and blood samples via touch-screen TV monitors, and learn about genuine forensic techniques. The hoTTesT TickeTs in Town We have a pair of tickets to see FLORENCE AND THE MACHINE Dec 7 at the Olympia, 7.30pm For a chance to win, e-mail your answer to the question below to life@metroireland.ie by noon today with Hot Tickets in the subject line. With your answer please include your name, address and a number where you can be contacted between 1pm and 3pm. Strictly one entry per person; entrants must be age 18+. Q. On which song does Florence describe flesh, pure as a wedding dress? A Hurricane Drunk B Howl The winner of yesterdays tickets to see Lisa Hannigan is: Saleh Rifaie index.html2.html3.html4.html5.html6.html7.html8.html9.html10.html11.html12.html13.html14.html15.html16.html17.html18.html19.html20.html21.html22.html23.html