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Bit parts: Garry Starr Performs Everything @swkplay

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Garry Starr Performs Everything is a bare-bones (and bare buttocks) tribute to the theatre. Theatre may be in trouble, and audiences are down, but Garry Starr aims to save the theatre and bring back to the masses every style of theatre possible. As long as each style involves wearing a transparent white leotard or a skimpy thong. And tassels. It's part comedy, part physical comedy and part perv at Gary's physical prowess. The sentiment "if you've got it, flaunt it" applies here. So here we are with a show that has been around for some years and is having its first proper London run at the Southwark Playhouse (Borough) through Christmas. The premise is that Garry Starr (played by Damien Warren-Smith) has left the Royal Shakespeare Company over artistic differences. He is now on a mission to save the theatre from misrepresentation and worthy interpretations by doing things such as a two-minute Hamlet, recreating scenes from a Pinter play using unsuspecting audience
Politics: New Labour testing ground

Labour is testing a series of posters that it may use in the election on the theme Britain is working. Don't let the Tories wreck it again (which borrows the same slogan from what the Tories used 10 years ago but anyway...). They are all are pretty underwhelming in the mudslinging stakes and surely must only appeal to the most die-hard of campaign fanatics...

Meanwhile over on the Conservative.com site, the new slogan: "Are you thinking what we're thinking?" is being rolled out... Quite cryptic really...

News: Crimes against intruders

Amid concerns that crime is out of control (and depending on what statistics you look at you could argue this toss one way or another), in the battle over what people can do to protect their homes during a burglary, new guidelines released this week say pretty much anything now goes. You still can't set traps or punish a burglar by death, but anything else is fair game. The advice was released to make homeowners feel safe about keeping that cricket bat by gun by their bedside table (who also will be voting in May as well)...

News: Mandela in London

Nelson Mandela is in London for the rest of the week to address the G7 industrialised nations about "making poverty history". He will also address a Rally in Trafalgar Square. Chancellor Gordon Brown is leading on the initiative from the Government, but whether any real action on wiping third world debt and giving developing nations real access to world markets is another matter...

Films in London

There are a couple of films shot in London screening here at the moment:
* Closer - drama with Julia and Jude etc... location map is here
* Creep - A garden variety slasher flick set on the London Underground and uses the disused platforms at Charring Cross.

Life Bits

* New haircut (check)
* New gym membership (check)
* New place to live (still looking)

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Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre

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