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Post by lynette on Jul 27, 2023 14:03:58 GMT
Middle stalls a few rows back. It is a small auditorium. I sat on the end of second row for the leg room and it was fine.
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Post by lynette on Jul 26, 2023 17:25:49 GMT
The only improvement that could have been made would be more of a nod to the unsavoury side of England fans during Southgate’s tenure. The rioting and violence of thousands who forced their way into Wembley for the Euro 2020 final, for example (I was there - it was appalling). Also the fact that while more level headed football fans totally acknowledge the progress made, even after the France defeat, he receives a huge amount of criticism and calls to go from people who despise him for his political and moral views as much as anything else. No, football fans who like winning don't like Southgate because he has an incredible track record of losing going back to 1996. After that he then lost the two major finals he reached as a player, one as captain. Then as England manager he has had a very strong squad at his disposal with players drawn from the best league in the world under the best club managers and he has had incredibly good luck with the opposition he has faced and the good fortune to effectively be the host nation of the 2021 Euros. And yet he always finds a way to lose. In the knock-out stages of the 2018 World Cup the first decent side he faced was Croatia and he managed to lose despite taking the lead and despite having a much stronger bench when it went to Extra Time. In the knock-out stages of the 2021 Euros he is lucky enough to play an even poxier side in the semi-finals, Denmark, and at home, and still can't beat them in normal time. Then facing a very average Italy side and despite again taking the lead he manages to lose a final at Wembley, despite again having a much stronger bench when it went to Extra Time. Then in the 2022 World Cup he finally faces a decent side earlier in the Quarter Finals and despite France missing key players they get him beat in normal time with that 36-year-old superstar of world football Olivier Giroud landing the killer blow. Some sportsmen are winners and some are losers. Southgate is a loser. He has always been a loser. But he has done a great PR job to convince the FA to continue to pay him £5 million a year to lose. It is a sign of the decline of our country and its spirit that we champion a guy for being nice despite him being the exact opposite of what is needed in his role. Because the purpose of sport is to win. And winners win and losers lose. That's the brute truth which a nice boy like James Graham can't or won't tell you. Have you seen the play? If you have, then I respectfully suggest you have missed the point. |
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Post by lynette on Jul 26, 2023 17:19:33 GMT
Time will tell……
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Post by lynette on Jul 21, 2023 12:55:27 GMT
Strikes off
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Post by lynette on Jul 17, 2023 18:00:46 GMT
New Musical? What do we know?
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Post by lynette on Jul 10, 2023 13:24:59 GMT
Really hard to make it funny via text alone. None of the references mean anything at all now except cheap shots ( unless teachers have actually taught the kids properly so they might then know a bit..) Might be interesting to let the purpose of the scene , the manipulation of tension, work with contemporary references. The scene was basically a ‘sucking up’ to the powers that be, making sure they got it, that WS was onside. This was performed before the king and you can bet whoever played this scene did it very carefully. The text we have shows us how tricky times were, the kind of ‘if you are not with us, you are against us’ mentality, so brilliantly referenced in Millers’s The Crucible, centuries later but about the same kind of totalitarianism. Shakespeare is nothing if not robust and copes with most fiddling.. I’ve seen that scene ad-libbed and with lots of new text and with a Scottish actress playing the part and it still isn’t funny. I’ve also seen it cut which is maybe a better idea. When Rupert Goold directed Lear with Pete Postlethwaite in Liverpool he approached Ken Dodd to play Fool and told him he could add any amount of new material he wanted. Sadly it didn’t happen, although Forbes Masson who did play it was really good. What a marvellous crowd pleaser and marketing joy: new stand up each performance with their material and style slightly adapted…” this Macbeth, eh? “ |
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Post by lynette on Jul 9, 2023 14:26:39 GMT
I read about that. I fear it says more about the director than it does Shakespeare. I have seen the Porter get plenty of laughs with the text as it woz writ. Requires the right casting and direction. Really hard to make it funny via text alone. None of the references mean anything at all now except cheap shots ( unless teachers have actually taught the kids properly so they might then know a bit..) Might be interesting to let the purpose of the scene , the manipulation of tension, work with contemporary references. The scene was basically a ‘sucking up’ to the powers that be, making sure they got it, that WS was onside. This was performed before the king and you can bet whoever played this scene did it very carefully. The text we have shows us how tricky times were, the kind of ‘if you are not with us, you are against us’ mentality, so brilliantly referenced in Millers’s The Crucible, centuries later but about the same kind of totalitarianism. Shakespeare is nothing if not robust and copes with most fiddling.. |
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Post by lynette on Jul 8, 2023 16:48:06 GMT
Pudding/eating. If it not well cast and disappointing, tix wont sell. Word of mouth v powerful. So let the actors act..
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Post by lynette on Jul 8, 2023 16:44:45 GMT
I’ve had a week of theatre this week as it’s been my summer week in London and been rather impressed by behaviour this week - however today during this afternoon’s performance of Mrs Doubtfire I was continuously felt up by the man next to me. (For context, I’m a big lad - but luckily for him I’m quite timid). At first I thought nothing of it as we were cramped in the seats and our legs were next to each other, but as the fingers of his hand on his knee wiggled more and more I got a little bit suspicious but didn’t think it was deliberate. Then in the second half, his hand moved down to under the arm rest and he kept trying to get his fingers under the hem of my shorts and onto my thigh… If I hadn’t used my arms as a barrier I wonder if he’d have tried to go further. As soon as the show was done I was up and running up the stairs to get out. What makes it worse, is that it wasn’t even his seat. He was meant to be the other side of the aisle, and when the guy who was meant to be sat in the seat came in, he thought we were together so offered to sit in this guy’s seat instead. I didn’t want to make a scene about it so tried to move my legs away as much as I could (which is not much in the Shaftesbury Grand Circle) and the ruddy binocular bracket thing made it near impossible for me at times. I found myself just trying to focus on the show as much as I could and try to make my arm barrier as strong as possible. Until the interval it just felt a bit accidental with the close confines so didn’t feel the need to say anything then and afterwards I just wanted to get away. But yeah, it wasn’t a nice experience and I hope it’s not a common occurance. So sorry this happened , how horrible but next time , if there is one, tell him to keep his hands to himself, nice and loud. He /another one will buff and puff but stay firm and if ness ask for another seat. Don’t worry if in the middle of a song/scene. |
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Post by lynette on Jul 8, 2023 16:41:09 GMT
It will be the same as always for me: no idea who they are but screaming at the telly by week three
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Post by lynette on Jul 8, 2023 16:38:11 GMT
Happy Days, starring Maxine Peake, at the Royal Exchange, back in 2018. The whole thing was utterly tedious - there was 5 minutes of plot, which then just got repeated ad infinitum for the rest of the first half. I suppose that's probably the point, but I couldn't stand any more of sitting there, watching the stage revolve slowly, as lights followed it around, meaning you got your retinas blasted into blindness about once every 90 seconds. Headache-inducing. Funnily, I’ve walked out of this play because although I had seen it more than once before, it was unbearable. Must have hit a nerve. |
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Post by lynette on Jul 5, 2023 15:46:15 GMT
See you then 😁
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Post by lynette on Jul 1, 2023 20:46:08 GMT
I’m not the most tech person around here ( mods alert 😁) but I do find the email tix thing irritating. Sometimes you can’t see the tix on the email and sometimes you get a confirmation and then another email with the tix so do you have to keep both? Then they all lie there in my flagged in no particular order. So scroll scroll as you enter the venue.
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Post by lynette on Jul 1, 2023 20:38:05 GMT
Harsh but not untrue
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:35:59 GMT
Does he stop after that birthday? No he doesn’t but he might rest up…Judi Dench is going to do an event this autumn, touring, on her book. I’ll be going cos you never know - her or me. |
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:32:50 GMT
It’s a long miserable piece. Perfect for the new Cox ( he used to be able to do irony and humour but Succession sucked it out of him)
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:30:20 GMT
Is this as expensive as Branagh’s Lear ( see other thread) ? Is this gonna be kind of auction of ever increasing egos?
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:28:05 GMT
Presumably dynamic pricing has kicked in. My partner just went to book a ticket the day I'm going and the cheapest is £200! That’s £100 an hour. Is it gonna be the thing we all go about for the next fifty years - “Did you see…? I was there.” Etc. No it isn’t. |
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:20:54 GMT
Looking forward to some sparkling enunciation.
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:19:15 GMT
I went to the Lightroom to visit the installation about Hockney. That was quite good if you already knew a lot about Hockney and it wasn’t cheap. Apart from that there is nothing there, a poor unstocked cafe and a nice place to sit outside. Otherwise pointless. If it going to be a theatre they had better get on with it.
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:17:02 GMT
I do wonder how one would quantify exactly how much money they supposedly generate for tourism though? Ask everyone exiting Heathrow if they're here to see the Royal family? OK, let me try to explain this as a foreigner in a country with no monarchy (Germany): There are countless people, mostly elderly women, who read godawful gossip rags every week that are filled with "news" from various European royal families and celebrities. The British royal family gets ALOT of press, with perhaps Monaco and Sweden (due to Queen Sylvia being German) a distant second and third. The Coronation was screened in full here over three main channels and there are endless "documentaries" about the British monarchy, too. All of this generates an interest in England as a tourist destination. People may not specically want to see royal palaces like Sandringham (hardly any German would be able to pinpoint it as a map) but it plays into the general cliche image of England and London - royal guards in red with their bearskin hats, Beefeaters at the Tower, Tea Time, black cabs, red phone boxes and so on. From there it's only a small step to book a trip to London to see all of that for themselves. Once upon a time English rock music might have been the best ambassador for England - young people in the Swinging Sixties, who wanted to see Carnaby Street, the Cavern Club in Liverpool, shop the latest fashion, see the latest bands and so on. But it's been a long time since Britain was perceived as cool and trendy and Brexit hasn't helped. So the Royal Family is one of the last things left that is constantly in the German media in a rather positive fashion, something that keeps/gets attention and draws people to visit England for all these quaint cliches they imagine. At the end of the day they may not spend much directly on the Royal Family (such as entry fees to Windsor or picking up a tea towel with King Charles on it) but they would have been what keeps England/the UK in the consciousness here. Interesting and on the whole a good analysis. But just to add that I have had chats with many taxi drivers, Ubers and black and they say that people ask to be taken to the Royal Stuff. You can visit “Buck House” like you can visit the White House. It works. The RF more or less keeps journos in their jobs, maintains the printed press and is an ongoing soap opera, entertainment. All in English the global lingo which tourists can mostly access. |
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 23:08:05 GMT
Gawd, do you know, with all the festering and sulking I've done on this ... that is such a reasonable and well balanced solution ... I'm on edge over this and am properly taking it personally; the bloke on the phone at the retailer was so condescending, and STAR blanking my original letter and now not answering my email from earlier this month .... You're not alone. I find I take it really badly when an organisation I'm spending my own money with treats me badly. It doesn't actually matter how trivial the issue is, it's just the fact of it. It really screws me up mentally with the injustice of how they get away with it. An example of something incredibly minor: I used a free members' ticket for a film at the BFI. (They're not actually free: you get two such tickets for your £35 annual membership.) They cancelled the show due to Covid and refused to reinstate the free ticket for when they reopened. It was only worth a tenner for goodness sake, but the attitude of their staff in emails upset me really badly. At the National Theatre, I spotted a manager, and asked her why it wasn't possible to buy a tea or coffee in the interval of an evening show, and I regretted asking. Her responses were so Kafka-esque and evasive, she put me in a foul mood for the second half that I couldn't shake off. I've had loads of far more serious things that drive me mad too. I'm currently waiting on a court date for the £500 Lufthansa owe my husband for example. (They paid me but won't pay him for the exact same delay.) I tried CBT a couple of years ago that was slightly helpful in trying to deal with the stress of all these situations, but it seems the best solution is to simply be the sort of person who doesn't worry about them and let's them go. Unfortunately, that ain't me. I'm very much a Victor Meldrew type who will not ignore bad behaviour. So we are not alone. NT staff a bit uppity - tried having a convo about the snacks available with one of them, thinking my suggestions might be met with a polite, ‘yes, I will pass that on” O no.I was lectured on the need for vegan snacks and sent on my way. It took a year to get payment back from a travel company post Covid when the law stated they had to refund me. The BA tix site like a Kafkaesque plot ( then told it was under maintenance, you’d think they could pop on message on it to that effect) Post Covid breakdown, lack of training, working from home or rather the bedroom in a cramped flat but better than expensive two hour commute? Brexit? Who knows. Prob all of these things. Don’t forget how really f* young people have been through lockdown, uni non education, but yes, a definite general mutual impatience and incompetence pervades. |
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Post by lynette on Jun 30, 2023 22:58:30 GMT
I saw this just now. Why start at 8? Should have started at 7.30, ended at just after 10, before the cafes all shut. Anyway, I liked it. All the performances were good. What is this thing with a couple of them about being untrained as if this were something heroic? Not going to win them any prizes amongst the fraternity I shouldn’t think. Sets good for small venue, lighting good as behoves a real pro and direction good. A slight lull in the tension beginning of second half. The heart searching songs from the female characters. Might have liked a bit of soul searching with Montague ? Will this go on to be a classic? I’m not sure. If I can read up on Hamilton then the US audiences can research this but not sure it will carry that far. Or am I already proved wrong. Anyone know?
I went with the OH who hated it. So not just for the oldies then 😂
re the pricing thing above- I paid the full Monty of £89, second row at the side ( need to stretch legs ) and I don’t begrudge it them. But I haven’t been to this theatre before cos never seen WinB so please could they put some of the profits into a new toilets for the gals, maybe rejig the men’s, take out the urinals and put in stalls so both sides can be for everyone.
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Post by lynette on Jun 24, 2023 21:43:38 GMT
The board exists for people to state opinions, reinforced or not. Picking on wording/expressions and so on doesn’t help anyone.
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Post by lynette on Jun 24, 2023 21:39:22 GMT
I thought they have air con at the Donmar?
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