Posts

Showing posts with the label video

Featured Post

He had it coming: Burnt Up Love @finborough

Image
Out of the darkness and shadows, three characters emerge. Lit only with candlelight or flashlights, a gripping tale by writer and performer Ché Walker about crime, punishment, love, and loss emerges. The fast pace conveys a sense of urgency to make up for lost time, lost opportunities, and what might have been. It’s currently playing at the Finborough Theatre .  We first meet Mac (Ché Walker) in prison, serving time for a crime he committed. With only a photo of his young daughter, Scratch, to keep him company, he looks for her upon release. But Scratch (Joanne Marie Mason) isn’t the teacher, lawyer or dancer Mac imagined while incarcerated over the years she might be. Instead, Scratch is in and out of trouble, on the edge, angry and violent. A chance encounter one night with JayJayJay (Alice Walker) forms a loving bond and gives her a moment of stability. But Scratch’s demons and restlessness mean trouble does not seem far away. Scratch's random act of thoughtless violence against
Read more...

Damp June Nights: Liza at the (Hampton Court) Palace

As more than one person noted after Thursday evening's downpour, there was not a dry seat in the house at the end of Liza Minnelli's concert at Hampton Court Palace . Opening the Hampton Court Festival , the steady rain or hour long wait for the train home did not deter fans from jumping to their feet even before she sang. Minnelli being from the old school of singing yourself hoarse does not have much of a high register anymore. While she seems like she sometimes tries to coax some sound out using sheer bloody mindedness, her signature songs don't sound like they used to. Of course her fans probably can't hear like they used to either so that might explained the high ovation quotient from the audience... But it is a shame that she either feels she has to sing them or her fans demand them from her. What is more interesting about her voice now is her incredible lower range. And when she calmed things down and performed songs just with her regular music director Billy
Read more...

Grim New Year: Sweeney Todd Preview

Image
2012 looks set to be delightfully grim if this teaser trailer for the Sweeney Todd musical is any measure... It opens at the Adelphi in March 2012... But it won't be all blood and murder... I'm off to see Cirque du Soleil's Totem tonight... More later...
Read more...

Architecture and Art: Summer Pavilion at the Serpentine

Image
This year's summer pavilion at the Serpentine Gallery is a hot noisy affair... Imagine a spaceship has landed in Kensington Garden (albeit one made out of wood) and is about to take off with various plant samples... While Peter Zumthor may have had in mind a tranquil garden and oasis from the rest of the park, in reality the noise is just amplified to unbearable levels with the hoards of people inside. And on a warm day it just feels so much warmer... Still the temporary concrete pathways leading to it are lovely. Tranquility is better found inside the gallery with Italian artist Michelangelo Pistoletto's exhibition  The Mirror of Judgement . It is  a meditation on religion and faith amongst cardboard and mirrors... It runs until 17 September and is worth a look... Free too...
Read more...

Coming up in December...

Read more...

Christmas Message

A special Christmas message from the London Gay Mens Chorus (taken from the Barbican on Wednesday night). Other extracts are available on YouTube or can be purchased as a DVD ... Oh and you can see everyone from the choir in it... If you look hard enough...
Read more...

Scenes from Piccadilly Sunday

All the talk this week has been about polonium-210 so A and I went to Piccadilly to find out what all the fuss was about... The sushi was definitely off the menu so we went elsewhere for a bite... Meanwhile the police have reportedly updated their investigation from an "unexplained death" to a "suspicious death". Polonium-210 poisoning does sound a bit suspicious as I don't think its a normal filling in a California Roll ... It would bring a new meaning to "Asian fusion" cooking if it did... The Economist this week offers helpful advice for dissident Russians living abroad: for longevity don't investigate the murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, the mysterious Russian apartment bombings in 1999, or the embezzlement of funds for Chechnya reconstruction. These subjects could soon find you loosing your hair too...
Read more...