Featured Post

I Miss The Mountains: Fly More Than You Fall @Swkplay

Image
Losing a parent when you’re still figuring out who you are and your place in the world seems like a bummer of a topic for a musical. But somehow, Fly More Than You Fall tackles grief and loss with a light touch, catchy music and enthusiastic performances. While it may not offer great insight into the exploration of grief, it gives pause for thought and a few laughs on the way. After all, death doesn’t take a holiday, and nobody gets out of here alive. We just hope it doesn’t happen too soon. It’s currently playing at Southwark Playhouse Elephant .  We first meet Malia as she prepares for summer writers' school. She aspires to be a writer and has a story in development. Encouraged by her mother to keep going, she is looking forward to the summer. But the summer school is cut short when her mother is diagnosed with stage four cancer. Back home so her mother can spend her last days with her family, Malia has to grow up quickly and find her voice while watching her mother slip away.  T

The Time Warp, muscle and fishnets: Rocky Horror Show 40th anniversary tour

Richmond Theatre never looked so different (or young) on Thursday evening as a packed audience -  many dressed as transsexuals or something in between - filled the theatre for the tour of the Rocky Horror Show, which is in town until the weekend. When you arrive at the theatre don't be surprised so see men in fishnets and cheap wigs and ladies looking like goths. This is a show where at least half of the audience will dress for the occasion. Or at least dress to look like their favourite character from the show. The other half of the audience that didn't make an effort (myself included) felt a little under dressed...

The Rocky Horror Show is celebrating forty years since it was first produced and is still as fun as ever. But now the years of audience participation (which goes from the sublime to the obscure) has given the show a feel of an adults only panto. The audience shouts out dirty, naughty or just plain bizarre things throughout the show which gives an element of expect the unexpected. Philip Franks as the narrator has the somewhat difficult task of responding to the various interjections while telling the story, which he manages with hilarious results.
Oliver Thornton as Frank N Furter bears an uncanny resemblance to Sigourney Weaver in Working Girl. But once you get past this coincidence he is a very pretty and muscular Frank And if you want to see his ass hanging out of a pair of fishnets, this is the show that will do it...


All told it was an energetic and enthusiastic return to the time warp. Perhaps the musical arrangements don't showcase the great rock and roll soundtrack at their best, but most people were having too much of a good time to notice that anyway.

One from the vault... And Richmond Station after the show looked a bit different too as people headed back to London...

The late night double feature boo with @Johnnyfoxlondon follows... The Rocky Horror Show is at Richmond this week before continuing its national tour... Check the website for dates...

listen to ‘Late night douboo feature: Rocky Horror Show’ on Audioboo


Popular posts from this blog

Opera and full frontal nudity: Rigoletto

Image
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
Read more...

Fantasies: Afterglow @Swkplay

Image
Nowadays no self-respecting gay play can be staged without full frontal nudity of some kind. It feels like the default response for the modern gay play now that gay rights are no longer an issue .   Afterglow, currently playing at Southwark Playhouse , serves it up in spades. From the beginning, three men are in a bed, naked. There’s what appears to be a very brief exhalation of ecstasy, before the obligatory rush to the shower. But the gratuitous nudity and excellent performances can’t conceal this is a pretty conventional and predictable story about a fantasy couple.  The three men in the simultaneous orgasm at the start of the piece are Josh, Alex and Darius. Josh and Alex seem to live in a New York world where they can afford a rooftop apartment in Manhattan while holding jobs as a theatre director and a grad student in chemistry. As writer S. Asher Gelman based it on his own experiences, perhaps gay plays with full frontal nudity are the way to achieve financial security
Read more...

Play ball: Damn Yankees @LandorTheatre

Image
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.
Read more...