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

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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...
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Scenes from Earls Court Tube District Line Eastbound Sunday 20:44. Earls Court used to be the ghetto for Australians, until rising prices forced them to move further north and west. You still see the odd antipodean living around here, but not as many... Nowadays the 18 Aussies living in a bedsit scenario is more likely to be in Hammersmith...  
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Scenes from Holland Park W8 Sunday 16:14 - On a fine sunny Sunday why do one park in a day when you can visit at least another, this time in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. A park so posh that there are sandpits at all the entrances discreetly signed "dog toilet" (no doubt so the small children found in the park don't get any ideas about making sand castles there)...  
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Scenes from Clapham Common Sunday 13:51 - An afternoon in the winter sun...  
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Scenes from Oxford St W1 Saturday 16:36 - Shopping is a popular pasttime on Oxford St when you get to the one or two shops on the street worth visiting... Of course everybody loves John Lewis...  
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Music on the weekend...

In amongst the domesticated shopping for bits and pieces today I did manage to stop by and say hi to Barbara Cook in Dress Circle today (or at least get her autograph). Since Dress Circle is such a temple for devotees of musical theatre it was very nice to see her stop by. I didn't buy her latest album which is a tribute to her long-time accompanist and collaborator Wally Harper (I saw them both in concert in 2004 but he passed away last year) but an earlier album. but most importantly I did get her autograph. A asked whether my life was complete as a Barbara Cook groupie and I had to think about that for a minute, but she is one of the great cabaret performers of our time. Oh and to just mix it up a little I also went to Trax Records in Soho and picked up Wayne G's version of "I just wanna fucking dance". The song was originally from "Jerry Springer the Opera" and was the highlight of the show. It was recorded over a year and a half ago by Alison Jier w...
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Television: Big Brother V George

Celebrity Big Brother finished tonight with the winner being the only non-celebrity in the house. The choice of winner was easy really since she was the only slightly human person in the freakshow of has-beens desperately trying to kick-start their careers that were assembled in the house. Still the highlight of the series will be the participation from rabid loony left-wing politician George Galloway. While in the Big Brother house he impersonated a pussy, danced around in a red leotard and basically showed he was a bit of a slimeball. It was fantastic act of political suicide and at last evidence that reality television is a force for good in the world. George says he has no regrets about his involvement in the show, but already this week cat food has been delivered to his house and office twice. Unless he was setting himself up for a career in Puss in Boots in the Christmas Pantomimes it would have to be one of the great political miscalculations of the year.
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Film: Brokeback Mountain

I caught Brokeback Mountain this evening. Like so many others I had been referring to the film as Bareback Mountain and I was quite surprised that within the first hour of the film it lived up to its name… By this point the film seemed to be more about that category of men that exists who identify as straight but just have sex with men – MSNs on the Wyoming mountains is probably not the best place to have safe sex outreach workers – particularly given all the bears that exist there. Anyway over the next two hours the story does get a little more involved, but it is more about what is not spoken that really starts making you wonder about the characters… The film has been doing well here in London, and it is probably more to do more with how well the story is told rather than its subject matter. But surely it should also serve as a cautionary tale to wives who let their husbands go to Wyoming to fish on long weekends?
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Scenes from Clapham Common Tube Sunday 15:24. I have moved to SW4 and it is cold... Just another January really... 
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