Paul in London

Source: www.donmarwarehouse.com I found myself having a discussion this week with a lady who suggested to me that Parade at the Donmar is the type of music theatre that young men go for. I was thinking about this all last night as I watched this great production. Is there something about (relative) youth that makes one enjoy a music piece about a Jewish factory owner who is accused of raping and murdering a young girl, found guilty and sentenced to death only to have his sentenced commuted but then lynched by an angry mob? Ok so it isn't the happiest night at the theatre but it was so well told, well sung and well staged you didn't mind the lynching and the preaching. You even had to look hard to see the trademark Donmar black brick wall. Looking around the theatre there was an over-representation of young men there interspersed among the usual Donmar types. The story is based on the true story of Leo Frank and the press frenzy that was whipped up by the case. The show works b...

HOT WAX , originally uploaded by the_moog . I hear she was a bit of a babe...

Woman: Oh that was interesting... Man: Yeah it was... Woman: Fancy some KFC?

The Brits love their tabloids. , originally uploaded by fueledbycoffee . They may not be able to find her, but she is talking to the Evening Standard about her dad...

BETHNAL GREEN , originally uploaded by the_moog . Those Bethnal Green rodents are good chameleons...

Source: www.royalcourttheatre.com Saturday night I found myself with Fliss at Rhinoceros at the Royal Court . I figured any play where pachyderms spontaneously appear and start running around the stage is my kind of show. Besides, I had studied it in high school so I knew it already. Fliss on the other hand declined to investigate further then knowing it was one of those weird-ass plays that Paul drags her to from time to time, but since it was my birthday she was bound to put up with it. Our evening started out as a comedy of manners as Fliss thought my paté starter for dinner looked like dog food (it did). Well that's those Sloan Square bistros for you. But during the second act the evening had taken its absurdist tone, as she leaned over to me and whispered, "You didn't tell me there was going to be full-frontal nudity in this". Well I didn't know that was going to be the case either. She declined to answer whether it was the first time she had seen a middle-a...

220920072512 , originally uploaded by Paul-in-London . Theatre dust thanks to the sets being smashed by a rhinoceros... More later...

Man #1: Look you are a 50 year old man. Deal with it. Man #2: Yeah yeah yeah... Shush.

Midweek theatre this week entailed going to the Greenwich Theatre to see a 30th anniversary production of Bouncers. For somebody turning 32 this week I figured I wasn't showing my age as much as this production. Sure the music had been updated and the cultural references had been too. But a night out had never seen so dated. If they were updating the play surely there should have been experiences of bouncers patting people down for knives, turning a blind eye to the GHB usage, and making sure everyone is drinking out of plastic cups if they are on the footpath. Alas it wasn't to be. Essentially the play is an extended comic routine involving four men who are bouncers and their experiences picking up women and observing men at pubs. It's meant to be hilarious but I suspect that depends on how much you have drunk at the bar. The four men as women seemed to be collectively channelling John Inman. I would have preferred it to remain a period piece but that might have been a t...

IT'S HARDER TO HOLD YOUR PINT WHEN YOU'RE STONED , originally uploaded by the_moog . Not sure what the story is about but it probably doesn't matter. The South London Press is an entertaining read for those who like to read lovingly retyped press releases and filler before the ads for Foxtons ...