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Post by sf on Jan 24, 2019 23:41:05 GMT
Who is Luke Shepard? What has he directed to cause excitement?
Among other things, the Southwark Playhouse's production of 'Working' in 2017.
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Post by sf on Jan 23, 2019 19:02:52 GMT
Well at least I won't have to pay for my Settled Status application
That's a start, but it's outrageous and indefensible that EU citizens are being asked to apply to retain the right to stay in a country they moved to legally, where they've built lives, paid taxes, contributed to their communities. Waiving the fee is a step in the right direction, but the whole process stinks.
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Post by sf on Jan 23, 2019 16:10:46 GMT
I would love to watch season 1 again, but until someone can find a way to erase Ellis from it, I can't. I keep throwing heavy things at the tv whenever he's on the screen. His character was horrendous. It's a double whammy: the writing for the character is awful - really, REALLY awful - AND Jaime Cepero's acting career is one of the universe's great unsolvable mysteries.
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Post by sf on Jan 22, 2019 23:44:59 GMT
And I still tear up when I hear “second hand white baby grand”
For me it's "The Right Regrets". I own both DVD sets and I'm afraid I do watch partly for the eyeroll factor (because I don't spend enough time rolling my eyes at the news), but that song gets me every time.
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Post by sf on Jan 22, 2019 18:48:20 GMT
Is it just me or is nominating Sam Elliot for Star Is Born just ludicrous? Don't get me wrong I like the guy, his film legend status was confirmed after his role in Road House, but I genuinely cannot remember one noteworthy thing about his few scenes in Star Is Born. "Nominations are like haemorrhoids. Every asshole gets one eventually." I do think he's good in A Star Is Born, but I think he's been better in other films (The Hero, for example - but he's the lead in that one). And I also think reasons beyond the merits of an individual performance sometimes come into play when people are being considered for awards - particularly for an actor who has been working for a long time, whose body of work is respected, and who has not been nominated before.
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Post by sf on Jan 22, 2019 18:38:49 GMT
God luck finding a chair.
I have never not found a place to sit when I needed one.
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Post by sf on Jan 22, 2019 14:48:16 GMT
They haven't nominated me for anything AGAIN. Obviously I'm going to have to boycott.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 21:18:59 GMT
And I'm just so sick of it all, all the scraping by on minimum wage, and lack of security, and never ending worry over jobs. And this has tipped me over an already precarious edge. I know that feeling very, very well indeed. Hang in there.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 21:17:27 GMT
I made vegetable chilli while talking to a friend on speakerphone. I didn't pay attention to which of the nearly-identical cans was hot paprika and which was sweet paprika. The result does taste good, but right now I could probably defrost the freezer by breathing on it.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 20:42:43 GMT
I honestly thought this thread was going to be about Marie Kondo when I saw the subject, I was all ready to come in swinging with a "she isn't saying you have to get rid of all your books, stop misrepresenting her!".
Well... her methods do appear to be a little on the draconian side:
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 19:24:16 GMT
I stopped listening after "they didn't like the Eurocrats in Brussels calling the shots". That was never the case; we've always had as big a hand as anyone else in shaping EU laws/regulations/trade policies, we have always been represented in the European Parliament, and EU law has never been something that was simply imposed upon us from above. I assume her (laughably wooden) piece goes downhill from there.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 18:17:32 GMT
As someone who goes to the theatre there several times a year, pays for a membership, and travels some distance to get to London - which means I usually arrive at the National very early for a show, get lunch or a coffee or both, browse the bookshop and maybe buy something, look at the exhibition spaces etc, and check my bag in to the cloakroom - I do not ever remember feeling that I "cannot enjoy the facilities because they are being hogged by people who are not going to the theatre". The worst I can say is that I've occasionally had to walk a little further with a cup of coffee to find a place to sit down.
Even before moving out of London I was rarely using the NT for just stopping off to browse and graze etc. But now when I'm in town I'll make a point of doing just that, so I can experience the naughty buzz of being inconsiderate and 'hoggy'.
Later this year I've got a day booked where I'm seeing a performance in the Dorfman in the afternoon and a performance in the Olivier in the evening. If I take a coffee into the lobby area from the espresso bar between shows, perhaps I should pin my tickets to my shirt so that the more judgmental participants in this discussion, should they be passing, don't assume I'm just one of the Great Unwashed who is only there for the free wifi.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 18:13:58 GMT
For all the authenticity everywhere else, it was a shame for the set to let the side down. It is vanishingly unlikely that a blue-collar Pennsylvanian bar would have Estrella on tap now, let alone back in 2000. And also, re: the set, that purely decorative, not-structural floor-to-ceiling iron girder obscuring the view of the stage from quite a lot of seats on one side of the house comes straight from the we-don't-give-a-sh*t-about-the-audience school of set design, and a less arrogant designer could easily have found a solution that provided the same visual cue without messing up the sightlines.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 17:25:10 GMT
Also, five points to anyone who can name the dancer with the light blue hair ? Toni Basil?
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 16:03:42 GMT
I think the billing rules changed slightly after William Daniels turned down a nomination for Best Featured Performance in 1776 where he was John Adams. As I understand it, it's less that the rules have changed - the basic principle is still that performers who are billed above the title are eligible in the leading category and performers billed below the title are eligible as featured - and more that it's become more common for producers to petition to change the category in which a performance will be considered. That is, the basic rule is the same, but it's flexible. And there are still some weird anomalies. For the revival of A Chorus Line, Charlotte d'Amboise was nominated as Best Featured Actress in a Musical for the role in which Donna McKechnie won the award for Leading Actress in a Musical in the original production. In both cases the billing was strictly alphabetical; presumably in 1976 producers petitioned to have the role considered in the Leading category and in 2007 they either didn't or the petition was rejected.
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Post by sf on Jan 21, 2019 12:40:01 GMT
Also glad about rush/dayseats. I don't believe the front row was ever on sale so seems logical they may use it for that. It seems to have sold ok during previews, I really hope the word of mouth spreads fast for this one. Could this win the Olivier award for Best New Musical? What's it's biggest competition? It's competition will be Waitress or Fun Home mainly. It will also be up against Tina probably and then the final slot will go to something else. Maybe Heather's but I really don't think Heather's will be an Olivier kinda show.
Maybe Hadestown? It got reasonably good reviews.
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Post by sf on Jan 20, 2019 21:03:09 GMT
it's damn time we had a Smash thread around here. I can't comment. I'm in tech.
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Post by sf on Jan 20, 2019 20:59:43 GMT
The website indicates a running time of roughly 100 minutes. Could anyone please confirm this?
It was slightly longer than that on Thursday night, but only slightly - it started a few minutes late and finished around 9.20pm. I would say expect 105 minutes.
The programme says the running time is 90 minutes (unless they've changed it since Thursday) and that's way off, and it isn't going to be attainable without significant cuts.
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Post by sf on Jan 20, 2019 20:56:12 GMT
The strap-on was fixed in its state at half mast. And even that was more turned on than this play is. Ouch. That actually makes me slightly regret that I won't get to see it. But only slightly.
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Post by sf on Jan 20, 2019 16:51:31 GMT
I just want to add that this was a significant and wonderful theatrical event for me. I saw it twice, once at the Young Vic and once on transfer, and I wish I’d had the opportunity to see it again. I’m lucky enough to see a lot of theatre, and sometimes I look back on lists of what I saw a few years ago - or even last year - and I struggle to remember a show (but maybe that’s down to age). But there was something special about The Inheritance, in the way it ranged over such a long period, touching on contemporary gay issues like adoption and marriage, the desperation of the AIDS crisis, and the tyranny of the closet, and how those generational issues reflect on each other; which in turn has a resonance beyond the gay community in considering what responsibilities we living today have to honouring the past and respecting the future. I thought it was a remarkable work and I feel privileged to have seen it.
So do I. I wish I could have seen it more than once, and if I lived closer to London I would have, but I couldn't justify a second overnight stay for it and Part 2 finished just late enough to make getting to the last train home on a Wednesday night (11pm) a big gamble. I had a few bones to pick with the writing, but that doesn't mean I didn't think it was a work of remarkable, unusual brilliance. And the production and performances were flawless.
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Post by sf on Jan 20, 2019 14:39:18 GMT
To be fair, if the odious (not to mention transcendently stupid) Liz Jones didn't like it, it's a sure sign they're on to something worthwhile.
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Post by sf on Jan 19, 2019 23:40:25 GMT
Is it structurally similar to Caroline or Change? Considering going but I found Caroline incredibly boring so if it's the same composer I might not like this either. Though I do enjoy Jay Marsh in anything
Caroline... is basically an opera (and was describes as such in the programme by the composer and librettist, at least at Hampstead). Violet is a book musical, albeit a music-heavy one, and it has far more in the way of standalone identifiable songs, some of which are very memorable ('On My Way', 'Luck of the Draw', 'Let It Sing', 'Lonely Stranger', 'Lay Down Your Head', 'That's What I Could Do'). There are some of the same 60s pop influences you hear in Caroline..., but it's a much more accessible score.
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Post by sf on Jan 19, 2019 21:51:16 GMT
End of the day the NT is a theatre, at least that's what it says in the name, so it does seem like a pity that at times people who are going to the theatre cannot enjoy the facilities because they are being hogged by people who are not going to the theatre.
As someone who goes to the theatre there several times a year, pays for a membership, and travels some distance to get to London - which means I usually arrive at the National very early for a show, get lunch or a coffee or both, browse the bookshop and maybe buy something, look at the exhibition spaces etc, and check my bag in to the cloakroom - I do not ever remember feeling that I "cannot enjoy the facilities because they are being hogged by people who are not going to the theatre". The worst I can say is that I've occasionally had to walk a little further with a cup of coffee to find a place to sit down.
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Post by sf on Jan 19, 2019 15:21:24 GMT
But what really caught my attention was that whilst four of these performances were in the correct catagory, Elaine and Susan were nominated for Leading Actress even though their roles are very much Featured. Is it just because of the amount of nominees for Company? Was it a particularly weak year so they were just placed there or was it just because those two roles are arguable standout roles? Whether a role is considered leading or featured at the Tony Awards depends on billing as much as anything else, and then a producer can apply to the committee to consider a role in a different category. I would guess Elaine Stritch was nominated in the leading actress category based on billing - she wasn't billed above the title, which is what usually puts a role in the leading category, but she got an 'and Elaine Stritch' on the poster when everyone else apart from the actor playing Robert was billed alphabetically - and that the producers petitioned to get Susan Browning moved from the featured to the leading category, where they expected to get nominations for other performers.
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 21:43:44 GMT
I paid nothing for the seat, didn't make the sea of moving people any less distracting, and there wasn't anyone in the seat in front of me. Just giving a helpful warning to anyone booking, as the cheaper back rows seem to be getting a lot of recommendation based on the usual layout. Pillars, balconies, edges of circles and overhangs don't move, people do. Personally, I'm way more distracted/bothered by that than having to peer uncomfortably because of a restricted view, and just wanted to give people that extra piece of information to consider. In no way, shape or form could those seats be described as "restricted view", and the rake is significantly steeper than the rake in the stalls of most West End theatres. It's a non-issue. For those of us who actually have to pay for our theatre tickets, more expensive seats are not always an option. As I said, for the price they're charging, those seats are reasonable value, possibly better value than the more expensive balcony seats, and better value than they have been for other productions in the same venue. When price enters the equation, sometimes you have to be prepared to compromise.
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 21:34:10 GMT
Even advanced plans sometimes fall apart.
Indeed:
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 19:38:40 GMT
Just downloaded it from I tunes. Says 1hr 20 mins so i presume this is an abridged version as the show was about 2 hours if I remember.
It's abridged, though nowhere near as abridged as the OBC. They've snipped out some dance music and some passages where the orchestra vamps underneath dialogue between verses of a song, presumably so they can get the total length down to what will fit on a single CD.
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 19:32:57 GMT
The lack of dildo details is disconcerting.
Now I'm imagining the show somehow incorporating the Dancing Dildos number from The First Nudie Musical...
(My brain is a scary place.)
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 18:00:14 GMT
...and one more thing: the programme and the signs in the lobby say the show runs 90 minutes with no intermission. Last night it was closer to 110 - which I expected, it's the same version of the script used in the Broadway production, for which the running time was listed as 1 hour 45 minutes - and they are not going to get it down to 90 minutes without making huge cuts, which I would guess isn't going to happen. If you're planning trains etc, assume 1 hour 45.
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Post by sf on Jan 18, 2019 17:55:45 GMT
cause multinational manufacturers to move their operations elsewhere For many - most - it's already happened. The various factories my relatives worked in have long since closed and been demolished. One uncle - a highly skilled engineer - was offered the chance of continued employment if he moved to Southhampton docks to work packaging the radios when they came in from the new plant overseas. His life fell to pieces, like the characters in this play. The current generation of engineers in my family work repairing and restoring vintage vehicles, almost all with brand names now dead or kept going on a much smaller scale by enthusiasts.
True. My point is simply that thanks to an entirely self-inflicted choice, we are on the verge of killing off most of what's left.
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