Featured Post

Prayers and thoughts: The Inseparables @Finboroughtheatre

Image
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...

Movies: Mamma Mia! (the movie)



After all the excitement of the weekend where one was part of the London Gay Men's Chorus performing their summer concert at Cadogan Hall, it was nice to unwind with a quiet movie at the Odeon Leicester Square Sunday evening. Well not quite quiet... It was Mamma Mia! And a special Gaydarnation preview for Pride weekend so a lot of the audience was gay, drunk, coming down whatever they took from last night, or all of the above.

All the stops were pulled out for tonight's preview, including organ player as pre-show entertainment, free lollipops and a souvenir brochure which made the exorbitant admission price for this exclusive preview week worth it (which was almost the cost of a theatre ticket - albeit not one to see Mamma Mia in the West End). The Odeon is still decked out in the cladding from Friday's premiere (above) as well so that was a nice touch too...

I have yet to see the stage musical after being put off by the awful cast recording of the show which I can only assume drained the show of its energy and exuberance, but I was not alone as most of the audience tonight had not seen it. So I got Mark who has seen it quite a few times to come along to see how much it was like the show. Well it turns out it is pretty much like the show and still rather fabulous, if just a little bit silly. Given the encouragement we were given to shout out and dance in the aisles that is probably not such a bad thing. There may not have been dancing in the aisles but there was dancing and grooving in the rows... I suspect given the state of the audience anything more vigorous was out of the question...

Meryl Streep, Christine Baranski and Julie Walters were all great and kept the laughs coming. Many of the musical numbers were also quite well put together... As for the plot, well while it has elements of farce about it, it also reminded me of the Southpark episode Cartman's Mom is Still A Dirty Slut which lasted right up to the conclusion of the film when some person yelled out, "Never mind all that, who's the bloody dad?!!" Well I suspect by this point nobody really cares...

This is a great night out at the movies, assuming you don't mind ABBA music and silly stories and chick flicks for older chicks. If you can get a group of ten or so people together, have a few drinks beforehand, then hit the cinema, it will be a great night. Well... That was the mix that sure worked well tonight... The film opens from Friday.

Popular posts from this blog

Opera and full frontal nudity: Rigoletto

Fantasies: Afterglow @Swkplay

Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre