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The brown word: Death on the Throne @gatehouselondon

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We’re warned at the start of the show with an upbeat number that this is not the usual sort of musical. And it turns out to be just that. But with boundless enthusiasm and energy from its two leads, who deploy a range of voices and breathtaking energy to create a series of voices for puppet characters, a bedtime story becomes a silly oddball tale about four souls stuck in purgatory. With puppets. And various toilet humour references. It’s currently playing at Upstairs At The Gatehouse . The piece starts as a bedtime story. Daddy (Mark Underwood) is about to read a bedtime story for Louise (Sarah Louise Hughes). But her stomach felt funny, and soon, she went to the bathroom. Then, for reasons that seem to only make sense in the confines of the show, they start telling the story of four people who died in unfortunate circumstances in the bathroom. Depicted as puppets, they’re stuck in purgatory as St Peter doesn’t have enough space for each of them in the afterlife. And so begins a puppe...
News: Another day, another suspect package

There is no benefit in staying back working late. I found this out tonight when the high street was closed off due to a suspect package found near the tube station. It turned out to be nothing and the main street has just now reopened. Its just another day of heightened state of alert where every package and every passenger is suspect.

Actually dealing with suspect passengers is easy now... You just get up and move to another carriage. I didn't think I would see this but I saw it on the Victoria line when a drunk man asleep across several seats was causing a little alarm to other passengers, so they got up and moved. Personally drunk men flailing about didn't strike me as likely terrorists.

Tonight as the Victoria line was suspended due to more security alerts this meant I took to walking on foot from Brixton to Stockwell. Along the way I noticed the terrorist safe house in Blair House that was raided overnight and the impromptu memorial of paper signs and dried out flowers outside Stockwell tube station to the Brazilian man killed last Friday.

Oh and it wasn't just an ordinary day going to work either. There were very few people on the tube, but there were six Transport Police officers at my station at 7.15 this morning... I did feel a little self conscious with my big bulky rucksack filled with my gym gear and iPOD wires trailing out of my jacket... But life (and the gym and not to mention the music) still goes on...

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Opera and full frontal nudity: Rigoletto

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David McVicar's oddly modern production of Rigoletto is back at the Royal Opera House . This modern and minimalist dark production has evolved over the years. It is better lit now but there is still an orgy and full frontal nudity within the first thirty minutes. This enables anyone not in the stalls an excellent view of a flaccid penis and a nicely shaved bush. But as time goes it seems more and more superfluous to the main focus of this tragedy of a court jester who seeks revenge. Here is hoping that the production continues to evolve... Conductor John Eliot Gardiner keeps the music well paced. Dimitri Platanias in the title role sounded great and received a rapturous applause for his interpretation of the role. You get a sense more of the doting father rather than the court jester or cursed man here. Vittorio Grigolo plays the Duke and sounds too lovely to be the cad the role calls for, but it is hard not to like when he is on stage anyway. And it is easier to understan...
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Fantasies: Afterglow @Swkplay

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Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre

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Damn Yankees at the Landor Theatre is one hell of a fun, sexy show. A great cast of dancers and singers give this show about a man who sells his soul to get on his beloved baseball team (and give them a chance of winning) new legs and balls. It also helps to up the ante with the sexiness with some healthy doses of cleavage and legs (and that's just the men). The musical is a retelling of the Faust story set in the 1950s when the New York Yankees dominated the game.
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