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Iron Maidens: Iron Fantasy at Soho Theatre

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Two women chase the elusive six-pack in Iron Fantasy, only to embark on an unexpected journey exploring what it truly means to be strong in today’s world. In a culture that demands visible strength and power, they subject themselves to lifting, protein powder-guzzling, and raw-egg drinking. Interestingly, consuming raw eggs elicited many squeamish reactions from members of the audience. None has obviously been to Cabaret to see Sally Bowles guzzle prairie oysters. But in the search for the attributes that make someone strong, a little more is revealed about being a young woman in the modern world. And that strength comes from a number of ways. It’s currently playing at the Soho Theatre .  It’s part performance, part musical, and part interviews, as writer-performers Shamira Turner and Eugénie Pastor, who make up the theatre performance duo She Goat, don a variety of silly costumes and play a range of musical instruments on their journey researching strength, fighting, and pumping i...
Music: The Fairy Queen (Purcell)

After Glyndebourne on Saturday I went to Royal Albert Hall on Sunday to see a BBC Proms concert of Purcell's The Fairy Queen. As it was a concert it was just the music (so it was only two hours) and it was a very enjoyable way to spend an early Sunday evening.

A had two tickets, one in the stalls and one in the circle. Rather than take up my suggestion of paper-scissors-rock for determining who sat where, he suggested that we swap seats at interval. That far more sensible suggestion turned out to be best as the seat in the circle provided a great vantage point to see everything, while the seat in the stalls was better for proximity.

Purcell in the cavernous space of the RAH may not be the best setting for this music, but it was nice to see it, and it reminded me that between now and mid-September I should be getting to more Proms concerts.

After the concert and as we left the hall to find somewhere to have supper, A spotted a few celebrities in the neighborhood, but I was too busy with those little Purcell ditties running about in my head to notice. Those things can seriously cause you to be distracted. Well that was my excuse for the evening...

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Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre

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