The Arsenalisation of our Xmas tree continues unabated...

The Arsenalisation of our Xmas tree continues unabated 🎄🔴⚪️ #Arsenal #ChristmasTreeDecoraring

 

Tree decorating. Stuart’s favourite Xmas activity. 🌲-> 🎄

As we get older, we have to come up other ways to get our tree home. Next stop - decorating!

And tree decorating is Stuart’s favourite Xmas activity. 🌲-> 🎄

My Neighbour Totoro (at last)…

When Stu’s mum fell ill obviously all theatre trips were cancelled. Stu was particularly gutted that he missed seeing My Neighbour Totoro - a show based on one of his favourite films. And sadly the whole run sold out months ago. 

But guess what? I managed to wangle us two tickets for last Saturday's performance. And after what has frankly been a fucking shitty week Stu is beyond excited. 😁 #boyfriendwin

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. ❄️🌨️

Saturday Night’s Alright (For Marmite)

By Air Mail…

It always makes me feel excited putting By Air Mail stickers on envelopes. Makes me feel like Joan Collins or a 1950s celebrity; like I should be carefully applying them while wearing evening gloves and a sparkling diamond ring.

Jacks Bar Closing…

Shame it couldn’t wash its face. Having an LGBT+ bar in Islington must have seemed like a no-brainier. I tried to support it when I could but the numbers just weren’t there. 🏳️‍🌈

World Cup 2022: 'Being gay should not stop me supporting England'...

“England fan Darce shares his experience of the 2022 World Cup as a gay man travelling in a country in which same-sex relationships are criminalised.”

Very proud of you matey. You have exposed the real experience of going there. The joy of the football vs the reality of the homophobia. It will be seen by a wider audience than any social media post! 

Fabulous Christmas Lights at Kew Gardens…

Today is Stuart’s mum Brenda’s funeral. RIP Brenda.

Today is Stuart’s mum Brenda’s funeral. A very sad day. But also a day to remember her fondly and to celebrate her too. 

Brenda, you were a lovely woman. And lovely to me. 

When Stuart first introduced us 16 years ago you welcomed me into your home and into your family. I knew we would get on at that first meeting when we shared a joke at Stuart’s expense! And we haven’t stopped laughing since. RIP. 

Aye Aye Matey!…

After a rather freezing cold run I’m slipping my aching bones into something I’ve not slipped them into for over 50 years. A soapy bubble bath. Aye aye matey!

Night Out With The Essex Crew…

Thanks for organising Den. Brilliant night out with the Essex crew at The Anchor. Great to see everyone. Laugh? I thought we’d never start! 😂

Kerry & Angie you were really missed.

But where are you actually from…?

Can I take a message?

"I'm sorry, they've just stepped away from their desk, can I take a message?"

“Yes, please. Tell them I know they're still at their desk. Thanks.”

The Band’s Visit @ Donmar Warehouse “The songs are witty, tuneful, and catchy. The story is light, funny, and heartfelt”…

Sometimes something comes along, that’s totally unexpected and equally a total delight. So it was with what Stuart and I saw last Friday night at the Donmar Warehouse in London’s glitzy West End.

The play, no not a play, a musical, that is small, modest, moving, and quite perfect.  

The premise is simple one. An Egyptian Military Police Orchestra are booking a flight to play at an new Arabic Cultural Centre in Israel. Only they get the name of the city wrong at the airport and turn up in a desolate place with a similar name in the middle of nowhere. Where they do end up has but a single restaurant and is in a quiet, dusty backwater of a quite desert.  

What then unfolds is a beautiful love story. I love story between two people (the excellent Moni Aboutboul and the fabulous  Miri Mesika), and between two peoples. The songs are witty, tuneful, and catchy.  The story is light, funny, and heartfelt. Think of it as a Middle Eastern Come From Away.   

The original US production of ‘The Band’s Visit’ stormed the 2018 Tony Awards and spent 18 months on Broadway. Which is pretty wild when you consider it’s a barely 90-minute musical with no interval, no dance routines, no power ballads and performed in Arabic, Hebrew and heavily accented English.  

If you get a chance, go see.

Othello @ Lyttelton Theatre “from a whisper to a scream missing fewer beats than a Bobby O remix.”

Last week Stuart and I went to see much-loved "Hamilton" star Giles Terera play Othello at the Lyttelton Theatre on London's glitzy South Bank.

 

This particular production is historic in that it marks the first time a black director (Clint Dyer) has staged the play at the National Theatre. So, our hopes were high.

 

Indeed, the whole production is purposefully and consciously exposing the normal white-gaze, with Terera the only person of colour in the cast, serving to emphasise the racism and jealousy that fuels the tragedy and Othello's isolation. An isolation felt by the character, and by the actor on stage.

 

Another good choice is the set - steps and terraces around the performance space, creating a look that is a cross between an ancient Greek theatre and a fighting pit.

The steps are peopled by an aggressive, all-white Greek chorus - or 'system' as they are described in the programme - which further helps drive the combative narrative of the racism rarely explored in some other productions of the play.

 

That said, Terara's Othello is a bit of a let-down. His fast-track to mental instability and anguish is just a little too fast. It doesn't take many whispered suggestions from Iago to get him to doubt Desdemona and for his behaviour to become utterly erratic and to descend into shouting and screeching. It is all a bit too quick - he goes from a whisper to a scream missing fewer beats than a Bobby O remix.

 

Sadly Paul Hilton's Iago is just a little too broad too. It would have been but a small step to have him mischiefly twiddling his moustache, rubbing his hands in glee, and giving us a 4th wall-breaking evil cackle to make him a full-on pantomime villain. Subtle it, ain't.

 

That said, we enjoyed the show. And it will no doubt pick up the pace as the run continues.

 

It is however not a patch on the sublime Adrian Lester / Rory Kinear masterpiece production in 2013 which for me is the award-winning gold standard.