When I put on a show, I don’t just aim to entertain. I endeavour tastefully to inform and educate my audience. So here are two important questions if you are considering the benefits of coming to the Pirate Bar to see The Sound of a Social Climbing Nun: What will I learn about Dame Julie Andrews? The shocking occupation in which she…
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Jan
My first appearance on a Fringe World stage was not at my show My Argentina: Learning Spanish and Loving Thatcher. A year earlier, a frumpy red-headed singer called Susan Higgins pulled me out of the audience to perform a liturgical dance with her. Miss Higgins is a recurring (and determined) character, played by the funny and…
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Jan
I was very taken at Fringe World 2015 when I saw Wyatt Nixon-Lloyd: 200 Voicemails. It was about what Mr Nixon-Lloyd found when he retrieved several years of unheard voicemails from his phone. As someone who causes major commotions among friends when I deign to send text messages, and who’s received 45 ‘likes’ (and counting) when…
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Jan
The musical Something Rotten! had its last performance on Broadway on New Year’s Day. This surprised me, because it had been playing for less than two years. That’s longer than Allegiance, but musicals are so expensive these days that they normally need much longer runs if they’re going to make any decent money. My niece…
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Jan
What will it teach me about The Sound of Music? That it isn’t really the story of a postulate nun who melts the heart of a sea captain, teaches his children how to sing, marries him and escapes from the Nazis with her new family. Instead, it’s about a social climber who ensnares a fraudster, humiliates his aristocratic children…
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Jan
My wallet says a lot about my 2016. It has public transport cards from Melbourne … … Sydney … … Washington DC … … London … … and LA … … but no Perth SmartRider … … though I do have a Luna Palace Cinemas card …
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Dec
Leicester is known for its Indian population, but it also has a Chinese influence.
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Dec
Yes, I am an old queen. In London in September, I thought about seeing The Play That Goes Wrong, because it sounded different. I chose instead a revival of a 47-year-old comedy – How the Other Half Loves – because Jenny Seagrove was in it. I remembered her from a Barbara Taylor Bradford mini-series in the…
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Dec
