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Wee liberties: Beauty and The Beast: A Horny Love Story at Charing Cross Theatre

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It may not be a tale as old as time, but it’s still the same old story, almost, with Beauty and the Beast: A Horny Love Story currently playing at the Charing Cross Theatre .  As the title suggests, this is not family holiday entertainment, but neither is it all gay gore. And a surprisingly large number of clever gags, a gorgeous-looking production, costumes, and an ensemble make for a classy night out with the occasional lashing of sluttiness.  It’s been a while since I have seen an adults-only panto. Like many things at the theatre—ticket prices, opening nights, age of social media influencers—things have changed. Happily, things have changed for the better here. The show focuses on assembling an excellent cast. Elaborate costumes by Robert Draper and David Shields’ set pieces help give this adult panto a touch of class. There are the usual lewd jokes and a quick flash of buttocks.   The setting of the story is in the northernmost village of Scotland, Lickmanochers. Not...
Theatre: By the Bog of Cats with Holly Hunter

Holly Hunter in a West End play was too good to pass up at £15, so I went to Wyndhams Theatre to see By The Bog Of Cats tonight. The house was half full so there was plenty of room to stretch out in the theatre.

It was an updating of the Medea story to Ireland amongst the peat bogs and the travelers who live in them, so that might explain why it hasn't found an audience. Holly Hunter could stand on stage and recite a list of vulgarities and it would be still worth seeing her act of course...

At crucial moments in the story the man sitting next to me kept rustling his bag of nuts which was a bit of a distraction, and just before Hunter's character gets killed by a man with a white face (not sure about the logic behind that part) somebody's phone went off. The magic of live theatre...

Miscellany

* Liquorice Allsorts are back on my table.
* Was followed tonight at Piccadilly Circus tube station by a man in a pinstripe suit and a cheap backpack.
* Have started looking in earnest for nice place to live in fabulous location... That has own bathroom and broadband. Apart from that, I am not fussy.

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