Alexander Stuart

Alan Cumming and Alexander Stuart in Hollywood. I recently came across these photos of a wonderful night out with our good friend, the immeasurably talented Alan Cumming . Alan is a household name for playing  Eli Gold on The Good Wife , but equally famous for his astonishing work as Hamlet  in cycle shorts (which I saw perhaps 20 years ago and still recall vividly as being the best production of the play I have ever seen). Alan also starred - and won a Tony Award - as the MC in the hugely successful Broadway musical Cabaret (coming back with Alan starring again next year) - and his equally phenomenal one-man Broadway version of Macbeth  (still running now). Anyway, Charong and I had a particularly fantastic night out on the town in Hollywood with Alan a wee while back, and here are the police mug shots to prove it! Alan Cumming, Alexander Stuart and a glimpse of Charong Chow. Photographs Above Copyright  ©  2013 Alexander Chow-Stuart....

The Khumbu Icefall - beautiful until it comes crashing down on you. My friend David Tait , who's climbing Everest for his fifth time to raise money for Britain's leading children's charity, the NSPCC , and to raise awareness of child sexual abuse (of which David himself was a victim at the age of ten), survived an AVALANCHE on Sunday April 28 2013, when a huge chunk of ice broke off and triggered every ice climber's worst nightmare: a vast roaring, raging torrent of snow and ice. Here is David's own account of what happened - from his regular David Tait Expeditions 2013 Dispatches: Dispatch 15, The Khumbu Icefall 28TH April 2013 – 5am.      “F*****g run!” screamed Woody at from the head of our 5 man column. Something within me instinctively knew why, despite not having seen the danger. Luckily my iPod was only entertaining only one ear otherwise I doubt I would have heard the warning. I glanced up high and to my left. There was my worst ni...

Dongchuan Red Land, China - +Incredible Planet Earth , Google+ Through some astonishing photographs posted on Google+ - most notably daily by +Incredible Planet Earth - I have been discovering new wonders on this fabulous planet we all share. The photo above of Dongchuan Red Land in a little known area south west of Kunming, capital city of Yunnan Province, China, reveals an extraordinary landscape, little visited by tourists. There are more stunning photographs and information about the area on a blog post by Impact Lab , called The Breathtaking Beauty of Lexiaguo, China. Antelope Valley, Arizona - +Incredible Planet Earth , Google+ This photograph of a striking shaft of sunlight in caves in Antelope Valley, Arizona prompted a comment by one friend of "Beam me up, Scotty" - and indeed it does seem as if teleportation might just have occurred, or be about to. Earth's oceans glistening in the sun, as seen from space - +Incredible Planet Earth...

I'm on a music video kick right now - and what better late-night listening (or anytime listening) than this sublime jazz track by Miles Davis , It Never Entered My Mind. I have nothing to add to musical perfection...except that co-composer Lorenz Hart was a close family relative of a friend of ours, Jane Hart - and it's hard to imagine that this slow, beautiful track came from a 1940 Broadway musical comedy, Higher and Higher.

While I was searching for the Bob Dylan/Johnny Cash video of Girl From The North Country , I came across this treasure: Dylan and Van "The Man" Morrison performing a lesser known Morrison song, Foreign Window , together, seemingly just for themselves (actually for the cameras of BBC's Arena arts program, One Irish Rover - Van Morrison in Performances ), in Athens during Bob Dylan's 1989 European tour.  (Sources: YouTube and Rolling Stone Videos )