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Still here: While They Were Waiting - Upstairs At The Gatehouse

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As the song goes, time heals everything. Or as another song says, it's time after time. Yet waiting—for a moment, a minute, or even a while—can feel like a chore. In Gary Wilmot’s slightly absurd and silly While They Were Waiting, the focus is on waiting and wordplay. No opportunity is missed to find more than one meaning in what is said. A debate arises about the difference between a smidge and a whisker. There's a playful riff on how you can be here and over there at the same time, depending on your standpoint. If this piece has a point at all, it depends on what you find funny. The concept of waiting-related language is, in itself, amusing, and there is plenty to laugh about in this show. It’s currently playing at Upstairs at the Gatehouse . The premise is simple: Mulbery (Steve Furst) arrives for an appointment and is kept waiting. What the appointment is for, we are not clear about but he is waiting for a yellow door to open. Nobody answers when he rings. He’s joined by th...

Theatre: High Society

It was practically a full house on Thursday evening at High Society playing Upstairs at the Gatehouse. That meant that Johnnyfox and I had to sit in the front row to enjoy this high energy and high furniture moving production. It must be hard to work in these productions to dance and sing your heart out, and then have to move the sofas about. When you're not worrying that they will drop a lampshade on you or kick you in the face, the cast in this show are great. And since the music is Cole Porter it is fairly enjoyable stuff it makes it hard to not enjoy it at some level...

On another level it is just an awful musical with a dull book and vaguely appealing characters. It probably was a bad idea to see a show with Johnnyfox that has lines that mention something about stroking her pussy out the back as well. And it wasn't helped by the decision to transplant the setting to England, perhaps so we didn't have to cringe at English actors attempting American accents. The ladies around us in the audience apart from being sympathetic to our tittering also provided some added amusement with their reactions to what was going on onstage, particularly as the evening wore on as being a theatre pub you can bring your drinks into the theatre. They were looking suspiciously like hard core Gatehouse goers... And they had sat well away from where the furniture kept flying in and out. Sort of worth catching... if you steer clear of the exits. Also avoid Finsbury Park when heading home as the vomit matches the floor there and you can go for a bit of a slide... Although Johnnyfox thought that was a tad more entertaining than the show we saw...

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