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One hundred people’s ninth favourite thing: [title of show] @swkplay

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[title of show] takes you back to a time before the fast paced social media where word of mouth for a positive show came from chat boards, video diaries or (god forbid) blogs. A simple staging makes it an ideal (and economical piece to stage), but it’s sweet and earnest take on just putting on a show, and putting it out there and taking a chance gives this show its heart. With a strong and energetic cast and endless musical theatre references, it’s hard to resist and it’s currently playing at the Southwark Playhouse .  It opens with Hunter (Jacob Fowler) and Jeff (Thomas Oxley) as struggling young writers in New York City. An upcoming New York Musical Theatre festival, inspires them to write an original musical within three weeks to make the deadline. As they discuss ideas, writers block, distractions and endless other good and bad musicals, an idea for a show emerges. Which is about writing a show for a musical theatre festival.  Their friends Heidi (Abbie Budden) and Susan (Mary Moor

Another take: This Comedian @EmbassyTea


Idil Sukan’s debut exhibition, This Comedian, is now at the Embassy Tea Gallery through to 8 March.

It is a retrospective of her creative work in production, design and photography in the comedy industry. The varied collection from the last decade includes 200 of Idil's portraits and photographs of live performance.


It includes comedians Eddie Izzard, Clive Anderson and Paul Merton (whose newly-released autobiography Only When I Laugh has as its front cover Idil’s most recent portrait of him); as well as performers who appear in comedy sitcoms and films, such as Patrick Stewart and Michael Gambon; and recent breakthrough artists such as Bridget Christie, Daniel Rigby, Sara Pascoe and James Acaster.

Honing her skills at the Edinburgh Festival, Sukan has been one of the most successful and prolific photographers and designers at the Festival in the last ten years. Traditional curatorial displays and marketing devices such as wall-to-wall poster coverage are recreated here. It is impressive and varied collection of visual marketing and documented portraiture. Worth a look and admission is free.

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