In truth, Inside Bitch is not quite such a visceral, blow the audience away piece. It is a thoughtfully and entertainingly devised workshop-style piece in which women who have actually been to prison go through a post-modern process on stage of trying to devise a women in prison drama based on reality rather than the sensationalism normally seen in films and TV dramas on that topic.
The show is just over an hour long. Some bits worked better than others for us but for sure we found the piece entertaining throughout. That, despite the fact that many of the references to film and especially to TV drama on the topic were wasted on me and Janie because we simply don’t watch/have never seen that stuff. But we could imagine.
The place was packed with the cast and crew’s nearest and dearest the night we went, which was preview Saturday, so the tumultuous reception was to be expected but was nevertheless deserved.
I have long been a fan of Athol Fugard’s plays. I started reading them in the mid 1980s when on a play reading spree: The Road To Mecca, Master Harold And the Boys…
…they don’t come around all that often to get sight of them. Yet, like London buses, sometimes two come along at roughly the same time. Next week we’ll go and see another one; Blood Knot at the Orange Tree.
Coincidentally, I have lately been writing up my 1988 theatre visits – which was another period during which two Fugards came along in quick succession – A Place With The Pigs:
This one, A Lesson From Aloes, was right up there, in my view, as a memorable night of top notch theatre drama.
Janet Suzman has directed a fine cast; Dawid Minnaar, David Rubin and Janine Ulfane, in this wonderfully claustrophobic play, set in the early 1960s, about left-leaning folk in the Eastern Cape having had their lives ruined one way or another by Apartheid.
As is so often the case with Fugard, the political undertones are played out in a drama about family and relationships.
In many ways Janie and I weren’t in the mood for this depth of drama on that Friday evening – we’d both had busier, more tiring weeks than we’d pre-planned – but the sheer quality of the play, performances and staging kept us both gripped throughout.
At the time of writing this production has only just opened and has not yet been formally reviewed, nor is it yet sold out. My advice, if you are reading this in time, is to book early to avoid disappointment. Here’s the link again…
…while here is an interesting rehearsal video from this Finborough production:
Janet Suzman was there on that Friday evening (I think the last preview night) so I was pleased to be able to tell her personally that I thought the production was extremely good.
It didn’t occur to me, when I booked Spring Restaurant, that Bobbie and I were meeting on the eve of the start of meteorological spring…
…but with the benefit of hindsight and subsequent thought processes, what a timely and apt choice that was:
Here Comes The Spring
Talking of timely, I thought I had allowed plenty of time to get from the office to Somerset House, where Spring is located, which indeed I had. I arrived at the South-Eastern entrance of that enormous building complex a good few minutes ahead of our 19:30 booking – only to realise that I needed to be several levels up and across to the North-Western side, where the New Wing and Spring are located.
I was still at the restaurant itself within 5 minutes of the appointed time, but, hell’s bells, Bobbie was already there.
Bobbie, she whose idea of timeliness is based on leaving home at the appointed hour, not getting to the venue at the appointed hour, was some minutes ahead of me, looking smug.
Under interrogation, Bobbie broke down and confessed that her plan had been to see the Charlie Brown exhibition ahead of meeting me, but had been too late for that and so was a little early for the dinner. Hence, both early and Bobbie-style late in the one fell swoop. This at least made more sense to me than the alternative hypothesis – that Bobbie is now better at time keeping than me.
The food, under the supervision of Skye Gyngell, who is apparently a big name chef, was excellent. Unfussy, good ingredients cooked, presented and served very well in a charming setting.
Bobbie went for the beef that evening, whereas I felt fishy and had a very tasty wild hake fillet. We shared some cheese after the main meal, which was an excellent selection.
Bobbie and I once again failed to put the world to rights despite agreeing how dreadful it all is and how much better it could be.
We also reminisced some more about evenings gone by – mostly very good ones – we agreed that many of our theatre visits 30 or so years ago, such as this one…
…were top notch. Although Bobbie is still hyper-ventilating a bit about The Long Way Round, which she rates as possibly her worst experience ever at the theatre:
I wanted to pick Bobbie’s brains about a weekend a few week’s earlier in 1989, when we went to see Don Giovanni and Ashley Fletcher came to stay, which I remembered as being somewhat of a low point for several reasons, more my own issues than those of the opera which I did not enjoy. I need to do some additional unpicking with Ashley on that one, but suffice it to say here that Bobbie and I had a good laugh about our slightly different but clearly linked remembrances of that June 1989 weekend.
But back to Spring on the eve of spring 2019 – the evening flew by and in fact it very nearly was meteorological spring when we realised that it was really quite late and that we should head home.
A few minutes earlier, we had debated the placement of lemons on about a third of the tables and I had concluded that they must denote reservations, but the waiter assured us that they were for decorative purposes only and that the choice of tables was random. He offered us a lemon on our table if we therefore felt bereft…which we agreed we didn’t.
I’m rambling. It was a very enjoyable evening and I hope we don’t leave it another year or so before we regroup.
Janie and I saw a trailer for this movie several times over “Twixtmas”, when we went to the Curzon to see several films.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg (RBG) is a member of the US Supreme Court, was an iconic equal rights lawyer in the 1970s and remains a very interesting character. This is a documentary film about her.
It didn’t open until January and we didn’t get around to going to see it, but i did notice that it was available for us to watch at home on Curzon Home Cinema, which we are eligible for at a modest hire price through my membership.
Now that we have a little Tivo thingie for the Noddyland bedroom TV as well as the living room one, we decided to watch this movie through streaming at home.
We’d certainly recommend the film and also the Curzon streaming service if you are a member and your internet/cable set up is good enough to take it. We’ll be watching more Curzon films at home rather than shlepping out to documentary movies from now on, I’m sure.
The Trick is also a quirky piece, but differently so. It is about loss, bereavement and the ways we need to trick ourselves into keeping going through life.
I thought we might find such a piece hard to take this weekend – our next door neighbour at Noddyland, Barry, died on Thursday night. But actually the piece was very charming, unusual and entertaining, without being heavy at all.
My only beef with the piece is that it was very bitty and that some of the bits didn’t really make sense. One scene, where the two younger performers simply made breathing noises into microphones, seemed, to me, to simply be a bridge between one of the quirky scenes (in which one of those performers read the palm of a member of the audience) and the next substantive scene about the ageing, bereaved woman and her decline.
But the piece was clearly intended to confuse the audience a bit and mix various genres of performance, ranging from direct story-telling (the Isaac Bashevis Singer story, The Little Shoemaker, is “thrown in” at one point) to chamber drama to audience participation to conjuring tricks. Entertaining throughout.
Here’s Eve Leigh, the playwright, explaining herself as best she can about it:
After the Bush Studio run, which goes on to 23 March, The Trick is going to tour many parts of the UK – here is the trailer including those tour details:
This piece was very well performed by the four actors and cleverly directed and designed.
Janie and I really like short pieces of this kind. Perhaps it is because we are getting older, but we now find 70 minutes of interesting and entertaining stuff a better deal than several hours of drawn out drama.
Baffling in parts but well worth seeing in our view.
Still, while not off our trollies, neither were we on the wagon. Indeed, John messaged me while I was still slaving away at the office over some silly numerical issues, already long-since forgotten, to let me know that I’d find him in Ye Olde Mitre rather than his office, when I picked him up on my way to Otto’s.
So there in The Mitre I found him and there I declined a pre-dinner drink; partly to keep my intake within reasonable bounds and partly because I was a bit later than intended and we really did need to set off in the next 10 minutes or so for our booking. The burghers of Ye Olde Mitre and the beadles of Ely Place might, if they notice such matters, have observed that this was the second time in a row that I declined to drink when entering that wonderful hostelry to join the yeomen of BACTA. Mind you, the place was heaving with people, so I doubt if anyone, other than John’s colleagues, noticed my abstinence.
We had a good chat along the way to the restaurant – John’s mum died just a few weeks ago and the funeral had been just a couple of days before our gathering – getting the funereal discussion out of the way before dinner.
Once at Otto’s, John was in an unusually “appy” mood – i.e. using his smart phone apps a lot.
Here’s John learning all there is to know about the rather splendid Burgundian wine we drank together…
…while this picture, of John’s Tournados, was taken by John and zapped off in mid meal – John’s way of making his carnivorous daughter, Bella, envious as hell at the sight of our meal.
Yes, John was clearly keen to show that he had not gone soft on me and was making an excellent Tournados-sized fist of such proof.
I also went for a very meaty option; the special of the day pork chop with mash, spinach and mushrooms. All cooked to perfection.
We both had started with lobster bisque – a classic starter served deliciously well.
I didn’t have room for a desert, but John, still demonstrating his robust dining credentials, went for a “death by chocolate” type thing which he (in collusion with the charming waiting staff) insisted that I try:
It would have been rude for me to decline the offer in the circumstances
When the pair at the next table – very senior gentlemen, so similar looking I took them to be twins – got up to leave, John got all “appy” again with their bottle of Margaux. I tried to capture that moment but was too late and John signally refused to repeat his research with a photo-opportunity-pose:
John completing his Margaux research at some distance from our neighbours’ bottle
It is always such a pleasure to have dinner with John – catching up on each other’s news over a good meal.
Otto’s was an excellent venue for such an evening. While I wouldn’t want to eat French classic style food all the time, we do it all so rarely now (there’s so much choice in London),so it’s easy to forget why that classic style is so enduring. When it is done well (as it is at Otto’s) it is a very, very enjoyable dining experience.
It’s been a wee while since we visited the Hampstead for no particular reason other than the productions not quite suiting us and perhaps less going on downstairs – our favourite part of the Hampstead.
Anyway, this one was downstairs and sounded interesting. A Trump-like American businessman who covets some unspoilt UK coastline for a golf complex using an employee with local connections to try and do his bidding.
Well, I’m going to say more anyway. We really enjoyed the play and this production of it. The way they designed some of the big visuals (golf course, construction site, neighbouring house…) into manageably small symbols on the stage was innovative, clever and entertaining.
The acting was all excellent, not least Yolanda Kettle as the conflicted young woman and Michael “Fatty Batter” Simkins as the Trump-like anti-hero of the piece.
I met Michael Simkins, many years ago, at Lord’s as it happens, where I passed an very pleasant afternoon chatting with him and Michael Billington. I’ll Ogblog that event in the fullness of time.
Meanwhile, Janie reckoned that Michael Simkins recognised me as the cast took their curtain call. I think she’s probably right, but almost certainly it would have been, “I know that bloke from somewhere…maybe cricket?”, rather than, “that’s the fellow I chatted with in August 2004 when I went to see Middlesex v Sussex at Lord’s with Michael Billington.”
In truth, Janie and I both enjoyed the first half more than the (shorter) second half. The plot seemed to resolve to neatly and easily for our taste. But as is almost always the case at the Hampstead Downstairs, the piece was interesting, well-produced and entertaining.
If I had needed any reassurance that cricket and tennis are my games and that golf isn’t (I didn’t, but still), this play would have provided it.
For someone who is making a conscious effort to cut back on midweek evenings out, this was not a high-achieving week.
11 February 2019, BDO Binder Hamlyn Partners Reunion, Guildhall
It started with a gathering of former BDO Binder Hamlyn partners at the Guildhall. Michael Mainelli asked me to join him and Elisabeth in helping to host that event – the first regathering of those partners since the firm dissolved into Arthur Andersen and other firms in the mid 1990s.
Of course, I wasn’t a partner in that firm, but during my five-to-six years with the firm I did do most of my work for audit clients. I also did a couple of internal consultancy projects – such things were normally considered to be career-blight for consultants, but I was either considered to be sufficiently dispensable or savvy enough to survive such trials – I still haven’t worked out which.
They are quite a centric bunch, the former Binder Hamlyn partners, in contrast with the quirkier group that descended on the National Liberal Club a few days later. Perhaps that explains why Michael didn’t trial his Gresham Society talk on humour in lectures. Instead, Michael made full use of his gavel and kept the formalities mercifully brief.
Actually it was a really pleasant gathering; just a shame there were none of the consultancy partners there who might have enjoyed the merry tale of my despair at my first assignment…
Anyway, I think the former partnership informally decided that it should regroup socially once every few years – certainly not leave it 20 to 25 years next time!
14 February 2019 – The Gresham Society Dinner – National Liberal Club
In fact we were on the way to the National Liberal Club when I discovered that Michael’s after dinner speech was to be on the subject of humour in Gresham lectures.
Excellent idea; it is always interesting when a professor chooses to speak on a subject about which he knows nothing…
…I said.
Michael laughed and then promptly added that joke to the start of his speech. It would be churlish to suggest that it got the best laugh of the whole speech, as there were lots of jokes in there…
…including, rather dangerously, I thought, one of my favourite intellectual jokes, the one about binary:
There are only 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary, and those who don’t.
I say, “dangerously”, because, of course, that is a joke that really only works properly on the printed page. As soon as you say “ten” or “one-zero” you have slightly killed the joke.
Had it been me, I’d have fallen back on my other favourite intellectual joke; the helium joke, which I think works much better orally than on the page, as long as it is delivered with good timing:
Helium walks into a bar.
The bartender says, “I’m sorry, we don’t serve noble gasses here”.
Helium doesn’t react.
Anyway, Michael’s after dinner talk was merely the apex of a very jolly evening. As usual, Tim Connell tried (and failed) to get through all the AGM business in five minutes. This time Tim double-failed; firstly by over-running in the first place, secondly by forgetting to re-elect the committee during the AGM bit which meant he had to hijack the start of the after-dinner revelry with that aspect of procedure.
Unusually this year we were graced with Iain Sutherland’s presence and he brought Bobbie Scully with him as a guest, which was a very pleasant surprise. Coincidentally, I had that very morning been Ogblogging about a visit to the theatre some thirty years ago with Bobbie to see the impenetrable Peter Handke play (or should I say dramatic poem?), The Long Way Round.
At the mention of this coincidence, Bobbie almost started hyper-ventilating as she remembers that particular theatre visit as quite the worst experience she can ever recall having at the theatre. If you click through you can read more.
Mercifully, Bobbie doesn’t seem to think that staying on for the second half was all my doing – she seems to think we both decided to stay out of charity to the performers, as we saw so many people leaving during the interval. So my memory of her begging me to leave during the interval and me insisting on us both staying is one of those false memories.
But back to the Gresham Society event, which no-one left early, even at the thought of an after dinner speech by Michael. It was, as always, a very convivial event with such interesting and friendly people.
Barbera Woodthorpe Browne organised a really charming touch for the evening – which ended up being on Valentine’s night this year due to availability of the venue – by sourcing large quantities of Valentine’s roses and seasonal gift bags enabling all of us to take the roses home to our loved ones.
15 February 2019 – Kim & Micky At Sanzio
The following evening Janie and I had dinner with Kim and Micky at Sanzio.
Picture from our previous visit in July 2018
I realise, looking at the picture from our previous visit, that we not only sat at the same table again but we even sat in the same places again. Here is my account of that previous visit:
This time I was not required to sign any disclaimers in the restaurant, but Kim was very determined to prove that she is “good at logic” by trying to demonstrate some logic puzzles on the table, using glasses, bottles and the like to try to make those “pattern-grid” type puzzles.
Janie and Micky were utterly baffled by it. I kinda got what Kim was on about (for once) but seemed to irk her by suggesting that such logic puzzles are not the be-all and end-all of rationality and indeed formal logic.
Meanwhile Kim’s dinner table logic puzzles started to look and sound like an old duffer demonstrating military maneuvers or cricket field placings by moving the cruet around the table. And the more Janie protested that she doesn’t/cannot engage with such puzzles at all, the more Kim sought to explain, while insisting that Janie can.
Meanwhile, I have a funny feeling that Jean-Paul Sartre was sitting alone at the next table, contemplating existential logic. After dinner, I heard the gentleman say to the waitress, “I’d like a cup of coffee with sugar, but no cream”. The waitress acknowledged his order and Sartre returned to his ponderings. A minute or two later, the waitress returned and said, “I’m sorry, Monsieur Sartre, we don’t have any cream – is it OK without milk?”
I joined the nice “front Row couple” I quite often see and chat with at SJSS (and also occasionally at The Wig). They asked after Janie, as usually do and we chatted about Janie’s mild aversion (or I should say relative aversion) to SJSS.
We also discussed the ageing demographic at both venues and I alluded to the fact that I sometimes still get called “young man” at The Wig, whereas not so at SJSS.
One of their number, Emily Worthington, describes the project well in the following vid:
…and also the next one, which is about one of their earlier Beethoven projects:
I couldn’t help but think of the Noel Coward song, “Don’t Put Your Daughter On The Stage, Mrs Worthington” despite the fact that the charming young clarinettist shows none of the unfortunate characteristics attributed to Mrs Worthington’s daughter in the song.
Anyway, the ensemble treated us to Czerny’s wind ensemble arrangement of Beethoven’s Septet in Eb Op 20. A light piece which was apparently very popular in Beethoven’s day.
Here is a charming performance of the original Beethoven septet:
The Czerny wind version has only recently been revived – essentially Boxwood & Brass seek out such versions for revival.
Returning to the phrase, “young man”, that really does apply to Carl Czerny, who was all of 14 years old when he arranged this piece for wind ensemble. Precocious little fella.
Meanwhile, as we upped and left the hall at the end of this excellent lunchtime concert, the nice man from the nice couple patted me on the shoulder and said, “see you soon, young man”. It doesn’t really count once you’ve seeded the idea to someone, but still I thought it was a kind, friendly touch.
Remember where you first heard the name of this Yorkshire-based wind ensemble, Boxwood and Brass; ‘appen they were champion – I were well chuffed wirrem.
I was keen to see this concert of young award-winning artistes, including two young guitarists, Jesse Flowers and Andrey Lebedev, who would be performing Elizabethan music. Actually, the Elizabethan theme included both Elizabethan periods – i.e. Tudor music and also music from the last 60 or so years.
Ian Pittaway gets really irritated when I mention Janie’s aversion to the lyrics of a certain type of Tudor secular song, which she describes as “Hey Nonie No” music.
Ian P points out, perhaps with some veracity, that there is only one Elizabethan song that actually contains the offending words, “Hey Nonie No”. Well, Ian ran out of road today, as the concert contained, amongst many other things, Thomas Morley’s It Was A Lover And His Lass, which certainly contains that line. I felt some of Janie’s finger nails digging into the back of my hand when we got to that bit.
But the Dowland songs were his usual darker stuff: In Darkness Let Me Dwell, Now O Now I Needs Must Part and Come Heavy Sleep, which Janie and I both tend to prefer both musically and lyrically.
Janie wondered why the words to these more substantial songs are not credited to their authors. I didn’t know the answer to that question but my guess is/was that they are words that had been handed down through oral tradition and that the first time they were published along with (e.g. Dowland’s) music, the authorship was lost in the mists of time. But at the time of writing I seek an authoritative view on this point.
Anyway, below is a more comprehensive list of the music played, taken from the programme.
Both of the guitarists played using modern, vertical fingers on the right hand rather than the horizontal finger technique Ian P is encouraging in me. I must say I thought the Tudor music sounded lovely on the modern guitar in the hands of both of these guitarists.
Janie and I also both enjoyed the modern-Elizabethan solo guitar pieces; Britten’s Nocturnal after John Dowland and Philip Houghton’s Ophelia…a Haunted Sonata. Let’s just say that we found the modern songs too difficult for us.
I had spotted sitting near to us one of my occasional real tennis pals from Lord’s, Michael, who I knew was an accomplished guitarist, as he had studied Benjy (my baritone ukulele/Tudor guitar) with great interest one time at Lord’s.
We chatted with Michael for a while during the interval, choosing not to bother with refreshments at that hour, before hunkering down for the short but more difficult second half of the concert.
Janie and I had never been to a Saturday lunchtime concert before and I’m not sure we’ll be returning on a Saturday lunchtime again in a hurry. It just doesn’t time well with our other regular activities, so it all felt like a bit of a rush, early in the weekend, getting to the Wig on time. Mind you, it is surprisingly easy enough to park around there on a Saturday lunchtime, we learnt…
…and we did very much enjoy the concert. Janie has decided to hedge her bets in the matter of the term “Hey Nonie No” music, by rebranding it as “Ring Around The Rosebuds” music. Very cunning.
Meanwhile I cannot find any examples of these youngsters playing Tudor music on-line, but here is a very young Jesse Flowers playing some Bach lute music transcribed for guitar, beautifully:
