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The greatest show and other bromances: Adam Riches and John Kearns ARE Ball and Boe @sohotheatre

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Alfie Boe and Michael Ball seem to be a bit of a joke act anyway. Their endless interpretations of popular songs (also known as covers) and their double-act bromance make them quintessential crossover artists where popular music meets opera and Broadway. And a perilous choice for the discerning listener. It’s not that they aren’t talented musicians and performers in their own right. Still, their musical choices are always safe, predictable and less than their potential. But every country deserves to have a pair of self-described national treasures that can tour the local arenas and give people a good time for the bargain price of £175 a seat.  And so the concept of Adam Riches and John Kearns - two world-famous from the Edinburgh Fringe comedians taking on this bromance seems like a curious choice for a Christmas musical fare. One can only hope that over the fourteen nights, it is playing at the Soho Theatre that the show evolves into something more substantial than a series of po...
Speaking of rubbish service, A and I go to Balans cafe in Soho regularly. I am not sure why as the food is more likely to be awful, the people often in there are freaks (usually exes of A's who are now hustlers) and the service is mixed. The one thing going for it is the location and it is a great space. I think that's why we keep coming back.

Wednesday evening was a case in point. Early January they gave me a voucher which was a "buy one meal get one free" deal. The deal came with a whole series of catches however. You could only redeem the offer Mon-Wed between 5-11pm and the moon had to be in the seventh house and Jupiter aligned with Mars. The fine print was so amusing that I asked the waiter what we could get with this deal. Eventually after much haggling he told us that A's all day breakfast and my burger would cover the deal so we made the order.

A few minutes later the waiter came back to apologise and say that breakfasts were not part of the meal deal and that if we could use the voucher another time that would mean that he wouldn't have to pay for the breakfast. I was amazed that not only were the planets not in our favour for the deal, but the management were so cheap and such slave drivers that they wouldn't cover a £5 breakfast but make their wait staff pay for it. Rather than make the waiter work a full hour to pay for our meal we decided that we would have the common decency to try and use the voucher another time. As for the meal? It was edible this time...

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