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Post by olliebean on Oct 13, 2019 11:16:30 GMT
"Number of users in queue ahead of you: 17534 The queue is paused." I'm guessing that means all the free tickets are gone. I never had a chance. (Opened it again in a private window just to see how many others missed out - 45649.)
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Post by olliebean on Oct 13, 2019 11:06:13 GMT
I think queue positions must have been assigned randomly when booking opened just after midday; I joined at 11:49 and ended up with over 18,000 ahead of me. Seems somewhat unfair, but what can you do.
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Post by olliebean on Oct 10, 2019 22:56:12 GMT
I’m calling it. General Election 26th November. 2nd December is being talked about, apparently.
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Post by olliebean on Oct 7, 2019 20:53:01 GMT
Any song list that doesn't include a new Oscar-baiting song is not to be trusted.
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Post by olliebean on Oct 5, 2019 22:47:53 GMT
I get the feeling the judges have been put under pressure to give marks that can be hailed as "the highest ever score in week x," or "the first dance y of the series has never scored that high before." Feels like there's been at least half a dozen highest ever scores already this series.
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Post by olliebean on Oct 3, 2019 23:00:29 GMT
Doesn't the Benn bill kick in if he fails to get a deal accepted by Parliament and the EU? Bit of a huge flippin' oversight, if not!
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Post by olliebean on Oct 3, 2019 14:21:35 GMT
His supporters. It seems to me that Johnson's whole "thing" is to play the thwarted hero. His plans won't work and are never intended to. They're intended to get shot down by someone that Johnson can then paint as an enemy hell bent on destroying his great vision. Not only are you right, but he's scripting the part right now - anyone who says words don't matter, bear in mind how specific - one could say uncompromising - Johnson's been with his language.
Benn is "surrender". This deal is "compromise". Presumably that makes no-deal "take back control", which he can build up to if needs must. Thwarted hero? Perhaps. If you're an MP called 'uncompromising' because you demand we 'surrender', on the other hand, maybe this thug will force you into signing it, making Johnson not thwarted, but the triumphant leader who never surrendered (at, lest we forget, a "war" he rhetorically started). I think he'd prefer thwarted, mind.
Either way, then, he can call Remainers "surrenderers" (truly terrifying to employ that language) or he can bully them with this rhetoric into making him pass a deal, for fear of being painted as uncompromising at best and surrendering at worst. Either way, his script for the next week will be "Compromise or surrender". The bastard's been setting this up. When the deal doesn't go through - which it probably won't - he'll either go to the electorate claiming that one half of the opposition wants to thwart Brexit and the other to 'surrender' to the EU's demands - or he'll go no-deal, because we tried to compromise, but we'll never surrender.
The worst thing is this'll work. Even as I disagree with "compromise or surrender", I realise how effective it is. If only he'd spent as long writing Seventy Two Virgins.
To Johnson's thuggish leadership, though, we all need to say "humbug".
Not to mention the accusations of "collusion" which appear to have been completely fabricated - but presented in the press as fact, and will be accepted as such by many.
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Post by olliebean on Sept 4, 2019 6:47:37 GMT
If the other parties can come to an agreement Ay, there's the rub.
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Brexit
Sept 2, 2019 17:33:10 GMT
Post by olliebean on Sept 2, 2019 17:33:10 GMT
So Johnson outside No.10 just now, pretty much confirming (although not in so many words) that if Parliament legislates to force him to ask for another extension, he'll just break the law and not do it. I expect he has an election in mind so he doesn't actually end up breaking the law, although he also made a big deal about how none of us want an election.
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Post by olliebean on Sept 1, 2019 11:45:06 GMT
Gove there, refusing to deny that the Government will break the law.
This is about so much more than Brexit.
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Post by olliebean on Aug 31, 2019 7:02:23 GMT
A poll carried out by a neutral market research company, no less. There ain't no such thing. Mostly they're happy to be biased whichever way they're asked to be by whoever commissioned the survey. Which, fair dos, I suppose is neutrality of a sort.
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Post by olliebean on Aug 30, 2019 14:34:51 GMT
Johnson, though, has been absolutely adamant that we are leaving on the 31st October, and even if the EU remove that deadline, that may well not prevent Johnson from sticking to it, doubtless whilst excreting a cloud of rhetoric about the EU trying to keep us in their evil clutches for even longer.
Assuming he comes up with yet another ruse to prevent Parliament from stopping him, of course.
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Post by olliebean on Jun 14, 2019 7:06:09 GMT
As I understand it, a genuine news report from that very day was edited in. I remember reading that the newsreader was surprised to hear herself in it!
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Post by olliebean on Jun 1, 2019 21:41:30 GMT
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Post by olliebean on Apr 15, 2019 22:29:30 GMT
I've not watched it yet, but for what it's worth all six episodes are available on iPlayer.
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Post by olliebean on Mar 31, 2019 22:36:25 GMT
Not to mention Jacob Rees-Mogg's father literally wrote the book on how to profit from misery and disaster.
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Post by olliebean on Mar 30, 2019 23:12:19 GMT
If she wanted to appease the ERG she would’ve dropped the backstop, so that doesn’t sound accurate, she just wanted to get her version of Brexit through Come hell or high water. She can't drop the backstop. The EU won't let her, for very good reasons. Moreover, the ERG know perfectly well that she can't drop the backstop, which is why they keep asking her to do so - it wastes time, which brings a no deal outcome more likely, which is their preferred outcome. Besides which, I believe it would be illegal under current UK law to have border checks between NI and the ROI, which would be necessary without some sort of customs alignment. (And which also technically makes no-deal illegal, not that I think May or the ERG give a toss about that.)
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Post by olliebean on Mar 30, 2019 7:52:04 GMT
Theresa May will now do everything in her limited power to not be held ransom to the hard brexiters, she would rather elect MEPs now just to spite them. You think? I get the impression somewhat that she'd allow us to crash out with no deal rather than accept any alternative to her deal.
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Post by olliebean on Jan 30, 2019 0:20:49 GMT
I saw the Mountview production of this a few years back and loved it. Tonight I saw this production, and found it something of a let down.
It was less affecting and more affected than the Mountview version; a lot of story and character arcs and beats either seemed muddled or didn't come across at all - my companion enjoyed it less than me, largely because some aspects had passed her by, that I had only picked up on by virtue of having seen them conveyed more effectively in the previous production.
At times it seemed too many people were singing different things at the same time, and it sounded a bit of an incomprehensible mess - I don't recall this being a problem with the Mountview production, so it must be to do with the vocal direction or sound mixing.
Except when that was an issue, though, the singing was great. I love the music and I really enjoyed the performances of the songs, but the direction felt rather flat and I really didn't feel engaged with Violet as a character, as I did with the Mountview production.
The revolve was over-used as a substitute for choreographing for the traverse, and I wasn't sure what location the set was supposed to represent, or why a fixed set was used for a show that isn't set in a fixed location.
Perhaps I'd have enjoyed it more if I hadn't previously seen a superior production, but as I mentioned, that wasn't the case with my friend, and I actually think my memory of the story helped. I do like the show, but I honestly think this production does it a disservice.
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Post by olliebean on Jan 26, 2019 0:06:11 GMT
Who do we petition for a Titus spin-off?
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Post by olliebean on Jan 2, 2019 8:47:59 GMT
I saw Violet at the Bernie Grant Arts Centre back in 2015, and found it a very affecting piece, and musically definitely worth seeing - I wouldn't let your dislike of Caroline put you off. Caroline, I felt, although I didn't dislike it, suffered somewhat musically from the libretto having been written by a playwright and not a lyricist; much of it is more recitative than song (the programme notes reveal that it was originally intended to be an opera), and the melodic style reflects that.
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Post by olliebean on Dec 20, 2018 9:35:43 GMT
Does any musical feature a character singing a duet with an older/younger version of themself? I have a feeling I've seen that, but I can't remember what show it might have been in. Who's Gonna Love Me, from Spend Spend Spend. That's probably it - I did see the West End production of that, nearly 20 years ago now.
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Post by olliebean on Dec 20, 2018 9:13:18 GMT
Does any musical feature a character singing a duet with an older/younger version of themself? I have a feeling I've seen that, but I can't remember what show it might have been in.
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Post by olliebean on Dec 9, 2018 21:53:32 GMT
Although actually, it's the 14th, 21st, and 28th of December.
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Post by olliebean on Nov 29, 2018 19:14:12 GMT
Have to say that the time I saw it the deliberate misinterpretation of the audiences suggestions highlighted how much of this is set out beforehand. Go and see it again, and see if you still think that.
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Post by olliebean on Nov 26, 2018 0:28:41 GMT
That was a good one by the standards of this series, but it's really becoming obvious now how poorly developed the companions' characters are, not to mention their relationships with the Doctor. You could pretty much drop any three random people into the companion roles in that episode and nothing substantive would have changed. And I have no idea at all who they are to the Doctor, which is a stark contrast to all the other companions since 2005.
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Post by olliebean on Nov 24, 2018 23:16:13 GMT
One major difference from Les Miserables is that Cats relies to a large extent on dance. I dread to think Tom Hooper might treat the dancing in this the same way he treated the singing in Les Mis.
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Post by olliebean on Nov 12, 2018 10:02:31 GMT
I think anti disability is also on the rise. As a disabled person that is worrying Especially worrying as it is being driven by government policy.
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Post by olliebean on Nov 12, 2018 8:46:50 GMT
the bottom line is that you can only actually run this country if you win. Or if you bribe another party to give you a working majority.
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