Alien Spouse

I'm sure Doc C did a very good job. Damn it!

Last night Doc C was telling me about a Drag contest he'd been to, and which I would also have been at if it wasn't for the whole fast-tracked Visa Interview thing.

And I don't mind at all that he got to be one of the judges.  I mean, I'm only slightly interested in Drag as a form of cultural and artistic expression.  Ok, I did my BA (Hons) Dissertation on how Main Stream Hollywood used Drag to discuss issues of Gender and Identity (It was called "Too Much Style for One Gender"), so?

Who am I kidding?  All those sequins, all those extravagant arm gestures, all those false eye-lashes and fake boobs!  And that's just the Drag Queens, this contest also had Drag Kings! 

Right now I'm probably giving Elpheba a run for her ruby slippers, I'm that green with envy.

Pekhs, you may not like this

On the Saturday before I left Norfolk, we went into Norwich so I could buy a few things (example given, a large jar of Marmite).  On our way back to the car we walked past the Norwich Playhouse, and parked outside was the Insect Circus.

We didn't have time to go in, but I did get some pictures of the van and they do have a website, which is quite charming if you don't mind insects.

I particularly like the art work on the posters, which you are apparently able to buy from the Insect Circuses ebay shop, except not right now for some reason.  I shall be keeping an eye out for them though.

Boeing, Boeing, Boeing

The Doc and I went to see "Boeing Boeing"  again tonight, it was my third time, and the Doc's second.  We don't even go and see films more than once, but there's been a cast change and we both really wanted to see what the new cast would do.  We went with our friend Richard, and it was a packed theatre.  The audience was having a great time, in fact the guy behind Doc C was scaring the Doc slightly, he was VERY enthusiastic in his appreciation. 

This time round I was interested to see what Doon Mackichan would do with the role of the German fiance.  She was following Michelle Gomez, who was insane in that role, so it must have been quite a tough act to follow.  Doon is a much more physically intimidating woman, because she is a lot taller and has swimmers shoulders (impressively she swam the English channel in 1998), so she doesn't need to be quite as mad, but she was still really funny.

I really liked Elena Rogers, who transfered straight out of the lead role in "Evita" to playing the Italian fiance.  She is so tiny, so she gets picked up a lot but she really conveys a great strength of character when she has to get angry.

The housekeeper is a plum role, and I've seen it played by three completely different actresses now.  It's Rhea Pearlman now, and I can see how similar Berthe is to Pearlman's character Carla in "Cheers".  She seemed really nervous to start off with, but once she had broken a glass and she and Neil Stuke covered it neatly, she really seemed to relax and have fun.  She certainly did the best scream.

I think three times is probably enough for me, but it is a very funny play, and even knowing where the gags are didn't make it feel tired.  This cast are so much more physical, there is a lot of dancing around and people being swept off their feet.  I liked it a lot.

"The Last Confession", Theatre Royal Haymarket

We went to see "The Last Confession" at the Theatre Royal Haymarket last night.  It's a drama based around the extremely short reign of Pope John Paul I (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_John_Paul_I), who had only been Pope for 33 days before he died.  .

The play focuses on the suspicions of Cardinal Benelli that the death may have been too convenient for some of the more powerful Cardinals who the new Pope was about to "send home".  I'm not at all religious, but show me a suspicious death surrounded by political manoeuvring and I am fascinated.

It is a very interesting story, but I did think the structure of the play was weird.  It starts with Benelli making confession to a priest, and then is told in a series of flash back scenes.  This works well for the most part, but there are a couple of crucial points which aren't shown in the first act, that are discussed at length in the second act.  I understand that these are the very aspects of the case that make the death seem suspicious, and no one is entirely certain what the truth of the matter is, but then maybe the play shouldn't be in a flash back format if you can't show everything you'll be discussing later.

There were also a couple of scenes when a character was stood slightly to one side, but was still on stage whilst another group of characters were talking.  It was quite often unclear if they were in the room, if they could hear what the other characters were saying or quite why they were there.

John Suchet plays Benelli, prompting the Doc to make at least one joke about Poirot in the Vatican, and he was really good. I think I liked all of the cast, but as everyone was dressed in pretty much the same clothes it was a bit difficult to keep track.  Maybe their costumes should be colour coded?  You know like The Marias?

All in all I was really glad to see an interesting drama in the West End.  I love musicals, but occasionally you need a decent drama.  It clears the palate.

Goodbye to the Booth!

It was the Doc and I's last day at work today. 

Doc C had baked up a storm, so we took in Banana Bread, Lemon Poppyseed Muffins and Oatmeal Raisin Cookies.  It nearly all got eaten, we've brought home one muffin.

I'd decided that, to celebrate both our last day in the office and Pride, I'd wear my huge pink net  underskirt.  I wore my black wrap dress over the top, and accessoried with all my favourite pink stuff.

Saturdays are always busy, so our last day went really fast actually.

We were given a lovely card, which nearly everyone had written something sweet or funny in.  It was very touching and we weren't expecting it at all.  On top of that we were given enough US Dollars to have a very nice meal with a really good bottle of wine when we arrive in North Carolina.

We happened to be closing up tonight, so after everyone else had gone we took some photos.  Me in the safe room fanning myself with bunch of £50 notes, and Doc C standing in the empty office.

I know both of us have found some parts of our job frustrating (If I never use Enta again I won't be sorry) but we are both going to miss the people we worked with.  They are the best. 

As Doc said it's an elite highly-trained ticket-selling force

Anne Rogers

The website for "The Drowsy Chaperone" (http://www.drowsychaperoneuk.com) has now been updated with photos of the London production, and as I was being dazzled by Summer Strallen's effortless high kicks I also looked at cast biogs.

I knew Anne Rogers looked familiar.  That's because I saw her at the Wyndham's Theatre in 2003 in "Over My Shoulder" a musical based on the life and career of Jesse Matthews.  She played the older Jesse, and her final entrance was particularly impressive.  She walked down a staircase, stage center, dressed in a gold sequin catsuit and matched her younger counterpart step for step in a really very complicted dance routine.  She was spectacular.

Celeb Spot: Does a great Peter Cook & a very fine Lancelot

I forgot to mention on Saturday that at lunchtime I was queueing in Pret behind Tom Goodman-Hill.  He's currently in "Spamalot", in which he is engagingly funny, but I had previously enjoyed his work tremendously as Peter Cook in "Pete and Dud Come Again" at the Venue.

Having long been a fan of classic British comedy, I have watched & listened to a lot of Pete & Dud, and I can assure you that Mr Goodman-Hill was amazingly good in the role of Pete.  It's not easy to convey both comedy genius and descent into alcoholism, but he did it extremely well.

On Saturday he was waiting for a coffee. I don't think he was in character at the time.

Bumper Celeb Spot

I have literally just seen pretty much the whole of the cast of "Boeing Boeing" having a good gossip as they walked along through Leicester Square, they were heading away from the theatre so I'm not sure where they were going.

Neil Stuke was chatting to Amy Nuttall (wearing a gorgeous bright green polka dot dress), followed shortly after by Doon Mackichan (in a jaunty hat, which really suited her) she was with Rhea Perlman and another lady who may have been Elena Rogers, but I couldn't see her face.

I've seen "Boeing Boeing" twice, but not with this cast (Apart from Miss Nuttall, who was very funny).  I am probably going to go again, because Rhea Perlman is fantastic casting for the role of Berthe.  In fact all of the girls should be amazing, Mr Dunbar & Mr Stuke had better be taking extra strong comedy pills to out do them...

Theatre Reviews

Today I read a really scathing review of "Macbeth", giving it just one star.  The reviewer said it was the production staged at the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park and the names mentioned were certainly the cast members, but were it not for that evidence I would assume we had watched totally different productions.

But then I read reviews in The Times and The Guardian, in which both gave "Lord of the Rings" four stars each and I realised it must be some sort of feverish dream, because that makes so sense whatsoever.

Damp Shakespeare at Regents Park

Ah, the risk you take with open air theatre is the capricious nature of the British climate.

The thunderstorm that was forecast turned heavily up about 5 minutes into "Macbeth", so we all rushed to ironic dry of the bar and waited for twenty minutes.  I took this opportunity to buy one of those terribly flattering plastic ponchos in bright green, it really brought out my eyes.  They may not be fashionable, but they are very effective.

The show proceeded and the audience all cowered under umbrellas, and I for one have extremely soggy shoes now.  It carried on raining but the cast didn't give up, managing to make it to the interval but no further.  The Met Office told the theatre conditions weren't going to improve, so it was then called off.  It's a pity, because it was very good.  I don't do physical discomfort, but if they had decided to tough it out I would have stayed.

Actually the rain worked really well with the action, for example the rolls of distant thunder were obviously very in-keeping with the whole tone, but also little things like the hem of Lady Macbeth's dress got water logged and soggy, but the rest of her looked dry as a bone. Lady Macbeth does get a fair few costume changes, and all of the frocks are great. 

So I would say that the first half was excellent and I'd recommend going, but maybe take some wellies.

The Scottish Play

Tonight I am unexpectedly going to see "Macbeth" at the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park.  It's had mixed reviews, but I really want to see it, because a) I've never seen Macbeth on stage and b) I love the Open Air Theatre.

We are therefore hoping the forecast thunderstorm is not going to happen.  It may be atmospheric for all the murder and magic, but I don't like to suffer for art.

Rent (2005)

I'm mainly in charge of The Doc & I's LoveFilm DVD selections.  I try to be fair about this and keep Doc C supplied with films he might actually enjoy but I do order stuff I know he'll hate, but that I want to watch when he's doing something else.  Yesterday when I got home "Rent" (IMDB) was on the door mat, a title solidly in the latter category so I made a cup of tea, got comfy on the sofa and hit play.

The plot is essentially a re-working of "La Boheme" set in the late 1980's, in New York.  The central issues are the relationships of a group of friends a who are effected in varying degrees by drug dependency and AIDS.

To be honest I didn't know very much more than that about the show, other than it's huge popularity, and so it was mostly the strong cast that sold it to me.  I loved Idina Menzel when I saw her as Elpheba in "Wicked" and so I was keen to see her as Maureen in "Rent" because that was the role that really established her on Broadway.  She's joined in the film version by most of the original stage cast, including her husband Taye Diggs.  All of the cast have great voices and the songs are really technically challenging (At least that's what the Doc told me, and he knows about that type of thing), you may well find it enjoyable to watch simply as a master class of singing.

The score is very strong, and I liked most of the songs, although I'll warn you that the opening song  has been stuck firmly in my head for 24 hours.  It's proven impossible to get rid of, but equally impossible to remember the lyrics to correctly, so it's just "Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes.  Blah, blah, blah..." on constant repeat, with an occasional "How about Love?" thrown in to break things up a bit.

So I liked the songs, I liked the cast, I liked the costumes, I liked the ridiculously nice slum they live in, I liked New York, I liked the 80s but there was something I didn't like.  Unfortunately it was the characters.

As you gather immediately from the title, no one has any money with which to pay their rent and they are under threat of eviction.  Initially I assumed there was some very good reason why they couldn't pay their rent, maybe it was really prohibitively expensive, but then I realised they just didn't want to, so by the end I was muttering, why don't they just pay the bloody rent?  Get a job, earn some money and pay the rent.  Finally one of them does, and he's disgusted with himself for selling out.

The drug addiction and AIDS depicted are both, fortunately, those very photogenic kind that don't stop anyone from doing whatever they want to do, with the exception of working for a living.  It must be so tragic to be forced to live a hugely hedonistic life, in an exciting vibrant city, surrounded by a close knit community of loving friends, but not have any sort of a work ethic.  Essentially all of the characters seemed to be having a great time, but then they really revel in whinging about it in great detail.  This may sound like a flippant assessment, but that is I think what I found most annoying about the whole thing.  You have these beautiful beautiful people with glowing skin, glossy hair and perfect teeth, they look so healthy and happy.  Heroin addiction (It's not specifically named, but hello what is Mimi's candle for?) and AIDS are life changing, but here they feel incidental.

To sum up their attitude I would like to quote from a very good review of "Ghost World" that I recently read on Cinema de Merde, and Scott has very kindly said I may use it here.

The song "Turn My Way" on New Order's Get Ready album goes “I don't want to be like other people are, down want to own a key, don't want to wash my car, don't want to have to work like other people do. I want it to be free. I want it to be true.” This lyric sums up a lot of what I see in the attitudes toward life of people of my generation [I'm 37] and those born after me; this feeling of: “Hello? I am so very special and unique that I shouldn't have to hold a normal JOB. I, who alone see through all the bullshit to comprehend the true essence of life, must follow my own personal muse and everyone else should a) pay for it, and b) feel glad to act as recipients of my inherent brilliance.”

Look around. Since the late 60s all the movies, music, books, and everything else is all filled with messages about what a special little snowflake you are and how you have to follow your heart and blaze your own path. The majority of movies are full of adulation for those who “break the rules.” Now more than ever messages are everywhere about a) how being a celebrity is the highest state of human achievement possible, and b) you too will be a star, it's just a matter of time before someone sees the TRUE GENIUS within your soul.

Thank you Scott!  Mr Telek is writing about a totally different film here, and he hasn't yet expressed an opinion on "Rent" so he may well totally disagree with me.  I do feel that the passage above explains perfectly the ethos that the central characters in "Rent" live their fictional lives by, and it is so anti-endearing.  It's actually quite frightening to read the rave reviews on IMDB or YouTube, from people gushing about how much they identify with the characters.

One storyline that is mentioned, but thankfully not depicted, is the killing of a dog "...An Akita named Evita...".  Angel is paid a large amount of cash for killing the dog by a neighbour who complains about the noise it makes (although apparently Akitas are in reality virtually silent), and this is supposed to be really funny.  It turns out later that this dog belonged to Benny, the landlord/ex-friend of the central group.  I ended up feeling really sorry for him, which is I am sure not the idea.

In all I'm glad I saw it, because the talent of the cast is phenomenal but it's ironic how hard they must have worked to appear in a show about a bunch of total slackers.  I'm also so very glad this was a musical because with out decent dancing and some great songs I would have been so annoyed and seriously bored by the end of it.

Monday 11th

Monday mainly involved aching upper legs.  As I had previously suspected, I am not fit.

Anyway that bit of the day was fairly dull, but it picked up in the evening with an extravaganza of theatre.  We were going straight from three hours of Tolkien based musical theatre, to Roger Corman based musical theatre.  So basically 5 hours of show tunes.

We started at 7.15 with "Lord of the Rings" at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane.  Technically the show starts at 7.30, but there is a fair amount of Hobbiting around before the show starts.  We had great seats in the grand circle and the theatre looked incredible, all covered in knotted branches.

It really is insane to try and cram all of the Lord of the Rings into three hours.  It does mean that you necessarily have to sacrifice the finer details of the story, and there are so many characters that you really can't get to know any one of them.  It doesn't help that about 9 major characters have long brown hair with flowing robes.

The show looked cool.  It's non-stop with the visual interest and it's very inventive.  The revolving stage that has so dramatically announced itself in the press with it's leg crushing capabilities (I only joke about this because the poor guy who was squished should be fine, thank goodness) was really clever.  The sections move independently from each other, and stuff.  I just got a bit bored with it after 3 hours.

We then had tickets to see the charity fund-raising midnight matinee of "The Little Shop of Horrors", this was in aid of Theatre Cares.  This is an Aids charity, which was one of the charities connected to the Walk for Life.  Every member of theatre staff, everyone on the cast and crew everyone was working fro free for the midnight matinee, even the theatre fee was waived, so that all the money from ticket sales was going straight to the charity.

Before the show we waited outside drinking pick-me-up lattes and theatre celeb spotting for all we were worth.  Name a West End show and someone from the cast was probably there.  Fun!  The best bit was when Sheridan Smith ran passed us, with a kicky short hair-do and a bunch of flowers.

We had great seats on the side of the fourth row and the theatre was packed.  I've blogged about this particular production before and how much I love it, but the atmosphere was amazing.  There was ad libbing, there were little extra bits of business and there was a stage kiss that went on for about 10 minutes, and smeared bright red lipstick over people in the front row.

I could say all over again how great this cast is and how much fun you would have if you go to see it, but I've said it all before and it doesn't get more true with repetition.  Just see it already!

Final analyse: I would see "Little Shop..." again & again, but probably not "LotR".

Fiddler on the Roof

I went to see "Fiddler on the Roof" on Wednesday, which I mentioned in a post but I didn't go into details.  I didn't write a gushing review, as I have for both "The Little Shop of Horrors" and "The Drowsy Chaperone", which really isn't fair because this is an excellent production.  It's just that I've come to realise that I don't like the show, which is really no reflection at all on the excellence of this cast and production. 

The main role of Tevye is played by Henry Goodman, who is funny and conveys a great deal of warmth in the role.  His voice (and every singing voice in that cast) is lovely.  If you like "Fiddler" I think you would be extremely happy.

My love for musicals is very specific.  I like upbeat, I like sequins, I like a big tap number and I really like to feel happy after I leave the theatre, just because I've been to the theatre.

The thing I found with both "The Sound of Music" and "Fiddler on the Roof" is that it's about such a huge event in history that the writers of the book assume that you already have all of the background on their story and so they don't tell you anything.  When I went to see "Sound of Music" there were people in the audience who did not expect the Nazis, there were actually quite a few children who had no idea who they were and were asking their parent to explain during the show. This is why I don't think of "Sound of Music" as a family show.

Anyway, back to "Fiddler on the Roof".  The show really underlines that the community that the whole story evolves around is Jewish, but I don't think that the story explains sufficiently that the village is in Russia for quite some time.  On the night I saw the show I am aware that there were a few members of the cast who were off ill, so there were actually only three Russian soldiers. It was kind of hard to accept that three Russian soldiers (one of whom is actually very avuncular and is well disposed towards the villagers) could force an entire village to abandon their home.

So in conclusion, there were no showgirls in hyper glamorous costumes and I feel that the show's book itself is flawed.  If you know the show already and like it, you will have a great time.  If you like to ponder the difficult dynamic of the father/daughter relationship, you'll have a ball.  If you like sad stories, particularly stories that provide a human face for an historical tragedy, then this is the show for you.

The Drowsy Chaperone (cont.)

Did I forget to say how good John Partridge was as Robert Martin?  How did I do that?  He is very very good, as the Doc said where did they find a guy who can sing, dance and roller skate blindfold whilst looking exactly like a twenties matinee idol?

The Drowsy Chaperone

We just got back from "The Drowsy Chaperone" at the Novello.  It was SO much fun, in fact I think you should go see it right now.  Ok, fine the next performance is tomorrow evening, so you should go then.

For starters Bob Martin, who stars as the Man in the Chair and wrote the book for the show, has transferred from Broadway, and he is so charming.  He is the audiences representative on stage and he mentions several times that he hates shows being interrupted.  I wonder if the irony was lost on the man who made my row stand up twice during the show?  Probably.

The show also stars the Elaine Paige, who certainly knows a good role when she sees it.  She was perfect for the titular heroine, and looks like she was having a ball.  She gets to sashay around the stage with a cocktail glass in her hand, dripping in unbelievable costumes.

I was particularly excited that Summer Strallen was going to be in it, who I saw as Maisie in "The Boyfriend" at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre.  I could have seen her this Christmas as "Dick Whittington", but I didn't take up the opportunity.  I am kicking myself.  She looked beautiful and wears a range of sequin smothered outfits that show case her legs.

The shows website has information about the London cast, but the production photos are from the US cast at the moment: http://www.drowsychaperoneuk.com/

The Doctor hates, loathes and detests musical theatre as an artistic medium in general, but there are a very few that he actually likes.  This is one of them.

Katie Kerr

The Doc and I just saw Katie Kerr, who is currently playing Chiffon in the fabulous production of "Little Shop of Horrors" at the Duke of Yorks.  For a 19 year old who has only just graduated from drama school, she is scarily talented.  Apparently she might be up for the role Tracey Turnblatt in "Hairspray" oh please, oh please oh please!  That would be so good, she would be fantastic.

Anyway she was looking lovely today in a very nice black and white dress with a red cinch belt.

Happy 2nd Birthday Billy

Billy Elliot sent us biscuits shaped like dancers on Friday.  I'm amazed there were any left when I came in to work today.

The Michelle Gomez.

I've been back in town for three days and I've seen one or two little celebs here or there, but no one really stunning.  Today on my way home I saw Michelle Gomez.  The Michelle Gomez. 

It's one of my general rules of thumb that I don't talk to celebs, because I never know what to say and it obviously would get ridiculously time consuming in London, however there have been occasional exceptions when I've been thoroughly star struck.  So today I did tell Miss Gomez that she is fabulous in her current West End show "Boeing Boeing".  She was lovely, she smiled and said thank you.

"Boeing Boeing" is a a sixties french farce about an architect who's engaged to 3 beautiful air hostesses.  The cast are all on top of their game in a very funny show, but Michelle Gomez really stands out as the German fiance.  I've walked past the theatre when the matinee audience is coming out, and all of them are talking about her.

Anyway now I can report that Michelle Gomez is absolutely tiny, how does all that funny fit in such a little lady?

Sheridan Smith has Great Legs

I've noticed that someone keeps coming to Alien Spouse by googling "Sheridan Smith, Legs".  I assume this is in the interest of research, and therefore I would like to confirm that, having seen Miss Smith in the role of Audrey in the current West End production of "Little Shop of Horrors", Sheridan Smith does indeed have lovely legs.

The Little Shop of Horrors, Duke of York's Theatre

I know I wrote about the Menier Chocolate Factory production of "Little Shop..." during my previous free trial at blogging, but I wanted to re-write it mainly because that review came across as a high-pitched squeal of incoherent enjoyment.  I still think it was amazing, but I can articulate now. 

• First of all it's a really good show which has fun do-wop songs, strong characters and a giant man-eating plant puppet. 
• Secondly it's such a strong cast Sheridan Smith, Paul Keating, Mike McShane and Alistair McGowan are fabulous and the Skid Row girls are amazing dancers/singers/comediennes.  The choreography of the girls opening number routine is genius.

I've always loved the 1986 film version with Ellen Greene & Rick Moranis, but there really isn't a romantic spark between them so it's hard to believe Ellen would fall in love with Rick.  In this stage version Paul Keating's Seymour is a nerd, but he's working that whole geek chic thing and is really cute, so of course Audrey is going fall for him.  I love Sheridan Smith's Audrey, with her tiny skirts and rhinestone glasses she looks amazing, but she is also so talented it's sickening.  The girl can vamp too.

Oh, and you get Mike McShane.  That is such a treat, he's a great actor, he's so funny and he is perfect for Audrey II.  My only complaint about the show is that "Mean Green Mother from Outer Space" was written for the film and isn't in the stage version, so I didn't get to hear Mike sing it.

Finally "LSoH" has the best website as well.  Every time you click on an item in the gallery little Audrey II sings or speaks to you.  So clever, go have a look www.littleshopthemusical.com

In summary let's put it this way, Doc C loathes most musicals but he enjoyed this, and not just because of Sheridan Smith's endless legs. I think.