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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...
Moving from NW6 to WC1

Today I finalised getting a new place in Bloomsbury. Hello Central London. Farewell West Hampstead. Its a downsize but a sensible location. Rather than pack of course spent way too much time wandering around West Hampstead, which seemed a little daft given the light sleet/snow that was falling from time to time.

Theatre: Talk to the hand/ass/stigmata

Jerry Springer outing last night wasn't bad, although some of the principals were not performing and it showed a little (lacking a bit of style alas). I sat next to a man from New York (who was in London for a week and had seen at least a show a night - although he was a theatre teacher/director) who enjoyed it a lot and couldn't believe what he was hearing (or seeing)...

Unlike a Jerry Springer show, the characters in the Opera are quite likeable which gives the show its charm amongst all the profanities. The morality of it all is still a bit ambiguous. Is it a critique of modern TV - the celebrity culture where people will do anything to get attention - or is it reveling in the swill of it all? It leans towards the former, but it also celebrates the latter, which is definitely an explanation as to why it gets up people's noses.

Outside the theatre there was also a group of little old ladies and little old men handing out pamphlets from the Christian Voice. This organisation is an anti-gay, anti-established Church (it's too liberal apparently) and generally bemoaning the debauchery and sin of Britain... Well compared to Australians the British are a saucy bunch so maybe they should all emigrate if they weren't so preoccupied with wanting to save Britain...

Anyway the leaflet makes a few arguments about the blasphemy and depravity of the show (particularly in the second act), but omits the fact that the second act set in hell is taking place inside the head of Jerry Springer as he falls unconscious after getting shot.

It is Jerry's version of Christianity that is unfolding and I get the feeling it is meant to be deeply offensive yet funny at the same time. In a way the audience is laughing at the extreme liberalism of it all. Of course it still all comes down to interpretation so no doubt there will be pickets outside whatever theatres it plays when it goes on its national tour. No doubt a little controversy will help the ticket sales, as it isn't the most commercial show to tour...

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