I have been drawn to small town and suburban stories since the early ‘90s when Britain’s Channel 4 imported an American sci-fi series called ‘Eerie Indiana’, which was like a ‘Twilight Zone’ for kids. It lasted only one season but had a Tim Burton-esque aesthetic and focused on the strange characters and happenings of a small town in Indiana.
As the decade matured so did I and I discovered the small town tales of Gen-X spokes-directors like Richard Linklater (‘Slacker’, ‘SubUrbia’) and Kevin Smith (‘Clerks’, ‘Mallrats’), which showed me how small lives and actions are amplified by their small town setting, never more so than in Jared Hess’s 2004 debut ‘Napoleon Dynamite’ set in Preston, Idaho.
Now, in the era of ‘Avengers’, ‘Avatar’ and the ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe’ I crave even more the subtle drama, delicate dynamics and sparse aesthetic of small town stories, which can still be found if you know where to look…
Mooreish Words
The first place I looked was my own hometown of Bromley, a suburb on the Southeast edge of London where David Bowie grew up and inspired a group of local misfits including Siouxsie Sioux, Steve Severin and Billy Idol to form the ‘Bromley Contingent’. The contingent were a bunch of punk fans who followed the Sex Pistols around until they imploded and then formed their own bands at the forefront of the new wave. I spent four years of my life trying to make a film about the ‘Bromley Contingent’ based on the autobiography of founding member Bertie Marshall who grew up next-door-but-one to Bowie. I failed, but the story of how is a good one…
Mooreish Sounds
Singapore, where I live now, is not only a small town but one of the world’s smallest countries occupying an island about half the size of London. Nonetheless it has it’s own pop music culture which is brilliantly documented in a brand new podcast series from Esplanade Offstage called ‘PopLore’, which contains some great nuggets. For instance, I recently reported that the first major rock ‘n’ roll concert in Singapore was David Bowie in 1983 but I was wrong, turns out it was Cliff Richard & The Shadows more than two decades earlier, as recalled by original support act The Crescendos!
‘PopLore’ is not just a podcast but a year long celebration of Singaporean music including concerts and videos (though I’d skip the latter as they are cheesy AF!). Find out more at https://www.esplanade.com/festivals-and-series/poplore/2022.
And if you’re unfamiliar with any local sounds, Esplanade Offstage has compiled a decent list of newish indie artists here: https://www.esplanade.com/offstage/arts/coming-unstuck-singapore-indie-acts-to-watch. I am particularly loving Vivien Yap’s in-your-face E.P. ‘My Period Is Here’ (lol).
Mooreish Visions
Greg Davies is a British stand-up comedian and, if you’ve ever seen his comedy panel show appearances, master storyteller who has written a new six-part series called ‘The Cleaner’ available on BBC Player in Singapore (iPlayer in UK). In it he plays a crime scene cleaner, which is really just a device to let him into other peoples lives at highly charged moments to tell their stories.
‘The Cleaner’ does what British comedy has always done so well; combine the sweet and sour of life into a quiet, touching comedy with laugh-out-loud moments. Each episode features a lead cast of no more than 2 or 3 incredible actors, (I’m sure Mr. Davies never imagined himself playing opposite double Oscar nominee Helena Bonham Carter!), set in Britain’s suburbs. There are no heists, murders (on screen) or explosions and yet it begs to be binged…
On the other side of the pond ‘Somebody Somewhere’ from HBO finally puts Bridget Everett in a starring role as a closeted singer returned to her hometown to take care of her dying sister and repair her fractured family. Set in small town Kansas, ‘Somebody Somewhere’ does what American comedy so rarely does in also being a quiet, touching but laugh-out-loud comedy AND, like ‘The Cleaner’, episodes are only half-hour long - perfect for tired parents.
(P.S. I’d also highly recommend Bridget in 2017’s indie Patti Cake$ about a frustrated female rapper trapped in small town New Jersey.)
Mooreish Art
Finally, Scarfolk is a fictional town in North West England that did not progress beyond 1979 and thus lives in an infinite 1970s time loop. Conceived by writer and designer Richard Littler in 2013, Scarfolk has a sizeable cult following online but I only discovered it a couple years back.
The joy of discovering something late is that there is already an entire archive to dive into and I still haven’t reached the bottom of this unsettling art project at https://scarfolk.blogspot.com/.
God may hate you, but I don’t. Thanks for reading and see you next Saturday.