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Searching undeterred: The Gift @ParkTheatre

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I recently had a few parcels go missing from where I live. The first parcel disappeared without a trace. The second parcel's contents were removed, and the box was left alone in the lobby. It's one of the things that you have to put up with living in central London. Apart from complaining to the delivery company and filing a police report, it crossed my mind to think about what would happen if I sent myself something rather unpleasant for a future parcel thief to open up. Well, Dave Florez's new work, The Gift, is in this line of thinking, except that the lead receives an anonymous gift of a turd in the mail rather than sending it to himself. It is lovingly gift-wrapped in a cake box from a posh north London bakery. It's a fascinating and hilarious three-hander currently playing at Park Theatre .  Colin (Nicholas Burns) is a little obsessive at the best of times. He doesn't let things drop quickly and is obsessed with the details behind anything and everythi...
News: Hitting home...

Mild hysteria erupted this week over reports that a craze that started in the dreadful bowels of all things evil - South London - now is spreading nation wide. It is called Happy Slapping and involves teenagers ganging up on an individual and hitting them, while taking photos of the victim with their mobile phones, before running off into the sunset, to post the pictures on the internet. It's supposed to be a new form of techno-bullying, but Does 'happy slapping' exist?. Well if it does, it is bound to spread to every mild-manered unsuspecting town in the near future...

Billy Elliotopened this week at the Victoria Palace to amazing reviews and some declaring it one of the best shows ever...

And finally, Kath and Kim premiered on BBC2 Thursday night. For those in the know (and with Sky), it has been broadcast for the past year here but now it is on free-to-air television it is getting a much broader audience. I suspect it will do well here, and it made the pick of the day in many newspaper TV reviews. I keep telling people that it is exactly how Australians live - although Melbournians wear darker colours usually - and aren't so much into shoulder pads anymore...

Potato, potato; pasta, pasta; plaque, plaque
Speaking of accents, noice and unewsual... I have found...
You don't say:
I'm having Paahsta for lunch
You say:
I'm having Passta for lunch
But I still say paaahsta. In fact, now I say paaaaaaaaaaaaahsta because it gets such a reaction... My colleagues make allowances for foreigners though...


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