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Prayers and thoughts: The Inseparables @Finboroughtheatre

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The Inseparables brings Simone de Beauvoir’s posthumously published novel to life. It traces a lifelong friendship between Sylve and Andrée, two unconventional girls who grew up in a stifling world where being a woman meant getting married or entering a convent. With a quick pace and engaging performances from the two leads, it is a journey back into the 20th century that captures two unconventional women trapped in a conventional world that will have you reflecting on how much or little things have moved on in the last century. It’s currently playing at the Finborough Theatre .  We’re introduced to Sylve praying for her country, France, to be saved from the war and indoctrinated into the world of faith and obedience. But too smart for all that, her life was full of detached guilt and boredom. But when she meets Andrée, a new arrival at her school, she is struck by how different she is from everyone else. She was burned in a fire and had a passion for life that nobody else she knew...
As luck would have it...
I read in today's papers that I was a few minutes away from being stranded underground on my tube ride to Hampstead Heath. Darn missing out on that adventure... The best commentary was a cartoon in tonight's Evening Standard where the station billboards stating when the next trains arriving were instead displaying "Next passenger... Joe Blogs 2 minutes, Mary Rose 3 minutes" and you could see these dirty people trundling out of a tunnel.

Spin to the end...
In a city desperate for news Alastair Campbell's resignation has filled the gap for now. Tony Blairs right hand man of spin was going to go anyway so it was not really a surprise... but the media to make a story started writing about why he went today instead of tomorrow for instance. The PR was that he wanted to spend "more time with his family". Such are the times we live in when such a noble cause is trotted out as an excuse when one's job situation is untenable. You don't quit or get sacked anymore, you just "spend more time with your family". Of course when you are an asshole like Alastair I guess they are all who are left. Of course, the papers all agree that it isn't the last we have seen of Alastair... (play scary music)

Handy things to know about Her Majesty's Governemnt
* The only people who walk down Whitehall are the tourists (and even they are few and far between)
* Don't stand at the gates at Downing Street, there really is nothing to see
* Don't let on you know anything about the government, as you may find yourself dead in the woods

And now for something completely different...
* Pacific Overtures tonight...

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