Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1443447
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 16 JANUARY 2022 8 ALMANAC My essentials CHANTELLE MICALLEF GRIMAUD 30, Freelance Performer and Creative I can be found hopping between Malta and the UK performing in musicals, comedies and Greek tragedies, creating and producing new work through my theatre company Prickly Pear Productions or teaching, directing and writing new work. You'll also find me on our new podcast The Actors' Atlas where we explore the international performance industry. www.pricklypearp.com 1 2 4 5 1. Book 3 2. Film/TV 3. Internet 4. Music 5. Place THE holidays have just passed, which means I ob- viously watched the Mup- pet Christmas Carol aka the best Christmas film of all time. (However, I will admit Klaus is a very close second.) I watch it once a year with my family – our little Christ- mas tradition. I recommend everyone watch it especially now that Disney have re-re- leased the original version which includes the cut song 'When Love is Gone'. Mi- chael Caine's performance in that is heart-breaking. STRAIGHT away I thought of the recent tragedy that is Paulina Dembska's murder. It's hard not to. A lot of my family live in Sliema so it feels very close to home in more ways than one. When I'm not in Malta I live in London where, over the past year, I've also been confront- ed with the several news sto- ries of other women my age that have been the targets of violent and fatal attacks in public spaces. For some rea- son I'm no more scared than usual but I am angry. Very. OK, so up until a year ago I had never heard this song but now I truly believe it could be the best song of all time. Margherita by Riccardo Coc- ciante. It is mesmerising. If you don't know Italian it doesn't matter because the way he performs it tells you everything you need to know, but it's also a good reason to learn Italian. He doesn't just sing it, he bares his soul. It makes me want to find Mar- gherita myself because she must be astounding. THIS is difficult. I want to go everywhere and see everything. I try to see beauty in all things and I try to give attention to detail because beauty is there, in the detail, and it's surprising how much we take for granted. Recently a friend thanked me for re- minding her to look up when she walks through Valletta, and it served as a good re- minder to myself. Next time you're in Valletta, or a new city, your home city perhaps, look up – at the balconies, the windows, the street names, the 'niċeċ', the street lights – and allow yourself to wonder. I started 2021 reading Jojo Moyes's 'The Giver of Stars'. It was a gift from my brother and unlike anything else I've read recently. It's based on a piece of American history regarding the horseback librarians of the 1930s. These librarians, most- ly women, would ride horse- back all day, carrying books to hard-to-reach communi- ties living in a 20-mile radius in the Kentucky mountains. Most of the families were illit- erate so the librarians would also read to them and leave picture books for the children. What a fantastic, inspirational piece of truth.