Featured Post

Wee liberties: Beauty and The Beast: A Horny Love Story at Charing Cross Theatre

Image
It may not be a tale as old as time, but it’s still the same old story, almost, with Beauty and the Beast: A Horny Love Story currently playing at the Charing Cross Theatre .  As the title suggests, this is not family holiday entertainment, but neither is it all gay gore. And a surprisingly large number of clever gags, a gorgeous-looking production, costumes, and an ensemble make for a classy night out with the occasional lashing of sluttiness.  It’s been a while since I have seen an adults-only panto. Like many things at the theatre—ticket prices, opening nights, age of social media influencers—things have changed. Happily, things have changed for the better here. The show focuses on assembling an excellent cast. Elaborate costumes by Robert Draper and David Shields’ set pieces help give this adult panto a touch of class. There are the usual lewd jokes and a quick flash of buttocks.   The setting of the story is in the northernmost village of Scotland, Lickmanochers. Not...

Eat your young: Unfaithful @found111


The central message from Unfaithful by Owen McCafferty is that it is still an older persons world. The older generation is screwing the younger generation over and over. They get the early retirements, they clinched Brexit, and they get free TV licences. All at the expense of the younger generations who will pay for it. And here those youngsters are also fair game for sex.

For fifty-something couple Tom and Joan, it’s too late to do anything else. They are stuck with each other. But the play opens with Tom confessing that he had a sexual relationship with a younger woman. So Joan seeks revenge sex by hiring a male escort.

Meanwhile Tara is bored working at the checkout at Tescos and her frustrated her partner Peter - a male escort - doesn’t have a day job.

And thus begins this four hander about relationships. It is full of dirty talk about eating this and fucking that. But mostly it is middle-aged sex fantasy and I suspect an excellent show to catch if you’re over fifty. For the rest of us it is a harrowing experience.


Sean Campion as plumber Tom and Niamh Cusack as his wife (and dinner lady) Joan, get the best bits (so to speak). As a vehicle to spit out the regrets of life they are focussed and funny.

As the fresh meat Matthew Lewis as Peter and Ruta Gedmintas as Tara have less to say (and do). But Tom and Joan only want them for their bodies anyway.

Earlier in the week I caught the National Theatre’s excellent (albeit expansive) production of The Deep Blue Sea. It is about lust, belonging and new beginnings. Catching this in the same week felt like a continuation of the same theme, albeit with filthier prose.

It is also short at 75 minutes straight through so you can forgive it for stretching credibility while attaining brevity.

Directed by Adam Penford with a simple yet slick set by designer Richard Kent, Unfaithful is at the shabby chic Found 111 until 8 October.

In a slow news week, Niamh Cusack wearing a badge expressing admiration for a naughty word also received attention. If they sold them at the bar I suspect they would be a hit.

⭐︎⭐︎⭐︎

Photo credit: Production photos by Marc Brenner


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 ...
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...