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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
At a Covent Garden ball last night:

Speaker: Ladies and Gentlemen, given the events of Thursday we had contemplated canceling tonight... But given the prevailing mood in London... (the room erupts into cheers).

I went with A to the ball which had a burlesque theme. That basically meant there were lots of tits with tassels, which anybody I think can enjoy. After a vodka and orange and a bottle of cheap white wine (that wasn't so cheap) good times were ensued. During the course of the evening a photograph was taken of me involving two ladies, a whip, a paddle and A. It was nothing like it suggests however... There were also boys in period costume selling bamboo folding fans so I bought one of those. One lady commented that it appeared only the men were using these frilly little fans. Well, it was one of those sort of evenings.

As I was wearing some rough denim and A was wearing leather trousers I did suggest that we could spend the rest of the night in some interesting bars around town, but we decided against this in the end. Besides, neither of us had the moustache (real or otherwise) to carry that look...

After the ball I was going to catch up with M1 and M2 for a drink, but they cancelled. They live near Manor House tube on the Piccadilly line which is now indefinitely closed. A 20 minute journey into central London would now take almost an hour if they caught the bus. I guess the city isn't as easy (or as convenient) to get around as it used to be.

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