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High anxiety: Collapse - Riverside Studios

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It’s a brave or maybe slightly provocative production to use Hammersmith Bridge on their artwork for a show called Collapse, which is about how everything collapses—poorly maintained bridges, relationships, and jobs. Nothing works. That’s probably too close to home for Hammersmith residents stuck with a magnificently listed and useless bridge on their front door. It gets even weirder when you realise the piece is staged in what looks like a meeting room with a bar. However, keeping things together in the most unlikely of circumstances is at the heart of Allison Moore's witty and engaging four-hander, which is currently having a limited engagement at Riverside Studios . The piece opens with Hannah (Emma Haines) about to get an injection from her husband (Keenan Heinzelmann). They’re struggling for a baby, and he’s struggling to get out of bed. But he managed to give her a shot of hormones before she started worrying about the rest of the day. She’s unsure she will keep her job with ...

Quick looks: Christina Bianco Party of One

Christina Bianco has concluded a short run at the Hippodrome Casino. An expert at mimicking any female singer she is now off to the West End transfer of Forbidden Broadway, but the highlight of her show was when she got a chance to just sing and be herself, or use the material from Forbidden Broadway (which was funnier).

Bianco has become a bit on Youtube with her singing songs in the style of other performers. She has a great set of pipes too.

She just needs a show that she can make her own. Here's hoping that comes soon for her. In the meantime future cabaret performances would feel more substantial with more jazz and less mimicry.


The casino itself seems to attract a pretty vile audience. On the Saturday evening performance it seemed as if security had to escort two people out of the venue before the show finished, and some people seemed to prefer viewing the show through their camera phones as depicted below. There must be worse places to work but I can't think of what they are.

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