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Same but indifferent: Laughing Boy @JStheatre

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Stephen Unwin's Laughing Boy, adapted for the stage from Sara Ryan's Justice for Laughing Boy, is a powerful and moving story about a mother and a family that keeps asking questions despite the victimisation and harassment from the institution - the NHS - that was supposed to protect her son. It's a moving, celebratory account of a life cut short due to indifference held together by a remarkable performance by Janie Dee as Sara. It's currently playing at the Jermyn Street Theatre .  Sara's son, Connor, is a little different to others. He is fascinated by buses and doesn't like things like loud noises. But as he becomes an adult, his seizures and unexpected outbursts mean the family turn to their local NHS for support. Little did they realise they would receive such little care from a service that was institutionally incompetent and covered up thousands of unexplained deaths of people with disabilities, including Connor's. The search for answers about why he

Movies: Nine

Back in London, a good cure for jet-lag is a movie... Although watching the movie musical Nine was probably not the best option... Only curiosity to see if it would get any worse kept me awake. The fatal flaw of this movie is to cast Daniel Day Lewis - a creepy actor at the best of times (as the above interview junket for the film shows) - in a role that required the audience to have some element of sympathy for him. It also doesn't help that in between the musical numbers there is some absolutely dire dialogue mostly set in hotel rooms spoken by actors with outraaaaeegeeshly leeedicrious accents. Best (or should that be worst) is Nicole Kidman's which varies from eeetaylian to okker Aussie mid sentence. It was hilarious even if her screen time was brief. There are some nice numbers sung by women in various types of pantyhose but after the best number in the movie - A Call From the Vatican - you feel like you could be Penelope Cruz's gynaecologist. Director Rob Marshall ma

Overheard at the gym...

White Man #1: Sorry I didn't see you there in the dark Black Man #2: Hey, I didn't see you in the light...

Scenes from A Church Yard London

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IMG_0020_2 , originally uploaded by Paul-in-London . Posted on a wall that borders a church... Interesting thoughts for the new year...

Going down under...

On holidays in Australia for the next few weeks so will be making a few observations from here ...

Scenes from Knightsbridge Saturday

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IMG_0025 , originally uploaded by Paul-in-London . The evening everyone decided to go shopping... While it was raining... And while there were several tube lines down...

Scenes from Fortnum & Mason

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Suspect Christmas windows... Posted via email from paulinlondon's posterous

Overheard at the gym Thursday...

Man 1: Yes what was how you used to do it? Man 2: It was 2 egg whites in the blender with the protein shake Man 3: Oh yeah that's right. After some pasta... Man 2: Oh no pasta. That's carbs...

Scenes from Carnaby Street...

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Spreadin' the lurve... See and download the full gallery on posterous Posted via email from paulinlondon's posterous

Theatre: Nation

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About half an hour into Nation , the new "exhilarating" production at the National Theatre at the Olivier Theatre, I hear whispered in my ear the words that you always wish you didn't hear on a night out: "This is a bit boring..." Alas it was the truth. The acting seemed one note, the direction flat, the music painful and there was also the return of the pointless revolve . As for the plot, it kept getting thicker every two minutes. It was as if the creative team decided to shove as much as possible of Terry Pratchett's book on stage and to hell with the consequences. Well the consequences were an awful lot of fidgeting in the audience as if they had fleas, a lot of watch staring and some fairly muted applause at intermission. Bearing all this in mind, I would have suffered the second half, but I took the advice of some wise theatre peeps who suggested that life is too short to sit through bad plays when you could be enjoying your life at the pub. I did sub

Overheard on the Tube home Tuesday...

Man 1: She gives me evils because I'm dis neo liberal like you know... Man 2: Yeah and wiv your business acumen and that...