Anna Nicole...

Last Saturday Stuart and I went to see Anna Nicole at the Royal Opera House in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

We absolutely loved it. Outrageous, funny, tragic, bright, busty, off colour, in bad taste and over-the-top. And that was just the audience!

Like it's subject matter the show was a riot. Starting from her humble beginnings we follow Anna Nicole oft-times surreal life from strip club to plastic surgery, from bumpkin to billionaire, and from court-room to mortuary. The husbands, the children, the partying, the drugs - it was all up on stage.

The orchestra played with gusto. The every-present chorus threw themselves into it. But the night belonged to Eva-Maria Westbroek as Anna. She was an utter, utter star. You just couldn't take your eyes off her. Or those tits.

And we were spared little by way of the libretto. Initially the swear words were spelled out "F.U.C.K." sings Anna followed by "F.U.C.K.I.N.G" But soon she doesn't spare our blushes and starts "fucking this" and "fucking that." Her mother then pushes things even further by dropping in the odd "cunt". And then to top it off things get rather poetic with a rounded "cuntalicious."

If you don't like opera, or if you do or if you just want to marvel, gasp and laugh for 2 hours you could do a hell of a lot worse than shell out £38 for Anna Nicole.

If nothing else for the people watching.

X-Men: Days of Future Past...

Last Tuesday night we had 20 mins of some storage company trying to sell us a NAS... before they then treated us to free popcorn, free sweets and a free showing of X-Men: Days of Future Past at Odeon Covent Garden.

The film was ok. But only ok. I wanted to be wowed though. And what was with that pyramid woman at the end? I guess we'll have to wait for X-Men: Apocalypse is 2016.

London Transport Museum...

Last Friday David and I went to the London Transport Museum in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

Steam trains, omnibuses, taxis and tube trains - there was lots to see and do. It was an entertainment and an education. Who knew the London Underground network used to go out as far as Southend-on-Sea?

Also just opening was a new exhibition: 150 years of London Underground poster - which was worth the price of the ticket alone. If you're ever at a loose end in town and you like that sort of thing - go!

Charlie and The Chocolate Factory...

Last night Stu and I (and indeed Mark and Sarah) went to see Charlie and The Chocolate Factory at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

Directed by Sam Mendes but still in previews we had high (but not stratospheric) hopes of it being a great show. This readjustment of expectations turned out to be a good thing in the end. Great it was not.

Following the book perhaps slightly more closely than either of the film versions Charlie and The Chocolate Factory tells the story of the poor Bucket family of mother, father, four grandparents and only child called Charlie. Charlie collects rubbish from around the dump where they live to give to his family as presents. Cabbage soup with no cabbage is their nightly fare.

Nearby the mysterious Willy Wonka runs a chocolate factory and after many years of secrecy is planning on opening up his factory for five lucky children to explore. Five golden tickets are hidden in Wonka chocolate bars the holders of which will get a tour and a lifetime's supply of sweets. A rag bag of largely horrible kids eventually win themselves a ticket each along with our hero Charlie. Then the doors to chocolate factory are flung open wide and the fun really starts. Or it should do. We were less than impressed to be honest.

 The first act takes place in the Bucket's dump. It's slow, has unmemorable songs and static staging. The only flicker of fun is the appearance of the other four children. Sadly even this was marred by the substandard sound. It was so poor you could barely hear what they were singing which was a shame as there were comedic lyrics that deserved to be heard.

Things picked up in the second half a bit with the appearance of Willy Wonka himself and the parade of multi-coloured scenes from within the factory. The Oompa Loompas were fun, the set pieces were inventive enough but the thing never really took flight. The pace wasn’t so much rattling as staggering. You didn’t really care about Charlie much and the fun usually which is usually to be had from the horrible kids and their various sticky ends was all but wasted. The staging was fine but back-projection has come on a lot recently (Ghost, Curious Incident etc.) and this wasn’t exactly cutting edge.

Forgettable songs, uninspiring staging and poor sound all did this show in.

Maybe it will improve after previews. Maybe it'll find an audience with kids. The coach parties will come from the provinces I expect but it's the weekday attendances that help a show sink or swim. It's not awful, it's just not brilliant. And at £80 a ticket it should be brilliant.

Matilda does Roald Dahl so much better - great songs and strong story telling. Sadly Charlie and The Chocolate Factory had neither.

Aida...

Last Friday Paul, Stu and I went to see Aida to the Royal Opera House in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

The plot revolves around Aida, an Ethiopian princess, who is captured and brought into slavery in Egypt. A military commander, Radames, then struggles to choose between his love for her and his loyalty to the Pharaoh. To complicate the story further, Radames is loved by the Pharaoh's daughter Amneris, although he does not return her feelings. Much machinations later... hey... it's opera - things never end well.

It was a full-on all guns blazing production and quite frankly we loved it. As you can see, we had posh seats too.

Swan Lake...

Last night Stu and I went to the ballet - to see Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake at the Royal Opera House in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

We had cheap and cheerful seats - well, I say seats - they were in the Amphitheatre Lower Slips Right i.e. standing in the gods. And we only got to see about two thirds of the stage. Which in fact was not that bad considering we only paid £6 for them. Luckily it was a symetrical production and so we didn't miss much of the action in the end.

It was a great show and despite the standing we loved each and every one of the four acts. Mind you, what's not to love about the Swan Lake? The music was as familiar as it was sublime and at the ROH the casting were - as one might expect - top notch.

As for the principals - Sarah Lamb as old swanny herself Odette/Odile was excellent, Federico Bonelli as Prince Siegfried seemed to fly around the stage but Christopher Saunders as the over the top evil spirit/von Rothbart stole the show.

It was Stu's first visit to the ROH. We'll be going back for sure.

Tannhäuser at Royal Opera House...

Last night Paul and I went to see the Richard Wagner opera Tannhäuser at The Royal Opera House in London's glitzy Covent Garden.

Based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg, the story centres on the struggle between sacred and profane love, and redemption through love.

It's a long opera - three acts - so we had to be in there for a 6:30 start and didn't get out until 11pm. A full 4 1/2 hours of Teutonic fun. It was high church opera with a lots of swelling orchestral flourishes and men stripped to the waist romping around on a bed. Marvellous.

Salome...

Last Friday Paul and I went to the Royal Opera House in London's glitzy Covent Garden to watch Richard Strauss's Salome - a music drama (OK, opera) based on Oscar Wilde's play. The production was really quite shocking: blood, nudity, gore and sex. The acting was great, the singing sublime and the set moved around like a stately galleon. Naturally we loved it.

I'd never been to the ROH before and I must say it was very impressive. Just what I'd expected. We had great seats too - access all arias.

One thing did make me smile though. As we were descending from the roof-top bar where we'd had our pre-performance drinkies I overheard one man say to his glamorous female companion, "Don't worry. I'm sure they'll be much better dressed in the stalls."


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