So what initially attracted you to these cheap seats to see two mega-famous actors on stage?

Slightly late post about the Children's Hour which Kate and I saw on Monday night at the Comedy Theatre.

What attracted me? Well - I think the title says it all. It's not a play I'd heard of and the asking price for tickets was around £60. But two things sealed the deal:
a) the chance to see the astoundingly attractive Keira Knightley (best role ever - probably Bend it Like Beckham) and Elizabeth Moss (most famous as Mad Men's Peggy, but will always think of her as Zoe Bartlet) and
b) Kate's discovery of cheaper seats with restricted view. Turns out the restricted view was barely anything - especially given my tolerance for £5 seats at the ROH. 

So we settled in for the show. And it's true the play is a bit clunky in places. It's also true the American accents went alarmingly wrong at times, deforming into posh Brit or bizarrely mangled vowels. But  I really enjoyed it.

The play is set in the thirties, built around two female friends and has an almost entirely female cast-list "When a troubled teenager starts to spin a web of deceit, all around her are soon caught up in it.  Karen Wright (Keira Knightley) and Martha Dobie (Elisabeth Moss) have worked for years to establish their all-girls boarding school, and now, with the school flourishing and Karen on the verge of marriage, their lives and loves finally appear secure. However, when malicious student Mary runs away from the school and seeks to avoid being sent back, she draws on hearsay, gossip, and her own imagination, to concoct a story that threatens the school, the marriage, and their entire futures. "

The plot was captivating - and Mary was spell-binding in her manipulation and bullying of the girls in her class. It made me think of 'We need to talk about Kevin' in the way that some adults saw straight through her lies and others were caught up - and Bryony Hannah was amazingly convincing as a young teenager, uncomfy in her skin but very confident in her own powers and with just an edge of vulnerability that left me twitching with anger at her and a slight worry that maybe there was something going on offstage that excused or explained her.

I also liked that it was a play full of women, and that the drama was driven by lies and their impact on a small community and on relationships - rather than by women bitching about each other and competing for men (or with men). 

There are several good reviews from when the play opened, including in the Independent, and the Stage. There's also some fairly trenchant critiques of the play itself as well as the performances. I'm really glad to have seen it - and them - for what I think was a fair price. 

A story without words

The Royal Ballet's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is their first new full length ballet with new music in over 20 years - and it is brilliant. I'd strongly recommend to anyone who likes ballet, enjoyed the book and/or appreciates superb stage/costume design - and there are loads of cheap seats if you book ahead (£5 in the upper slips...)


They've captured the story, the specific scenes and the sense of fun and punning - but entirely through dance. And they've snuck in some funny inter-textual (or inter-dansual?) jokes too.


Also - watch out for Simon Russell Beale as Duchess.

How to browse a bookshop

So, lesson one happened earlier this week - and my lovely pupil didn't buy anything but did pronounce herself very happy and said she'd found it quite exciting (?!?)

What did we do?
1) Homework in advance - I suggested she should read the weekend papers for a couple of weeks, obviously focussing on the review section. I'm an Observer reader by habit, she tends to the Times and I think (but haven't checked) that whatever paper you normally read, it's likely that their review section will reflect your tastes.

2) Getting to the bookshop - we went for the big Waterstones on Piccadilly. I know it's obvious and corporate, but it's big with lots of choice and open late into the evening, which seems far more civilised than late-night opening by other shops. And 15 mins walk from work, which is also good.

3) Let the browsing commence - so we mooched, floor-by-floor. Ground floor not so good - it's more like a WHSmith with all sorts of random tat; but 1st floor upwards is brilliant. 


We talked about how important book covers are (massively, and I think helpfully - but I'm not such a fan of every book by an author having the same design of cover) and about how you choose what to pick up. I love beautiful books - the Virago classics hardbacks with beautiful covers spurred me to buy loads that I wouldn't have picked up otherwise. But I won't even touch pastel-covered chick lit, and have a fairly strong prejudice against books that have the author's name (or a sword) embossed in silver or gold on the cover.

Being a better friend?

I'm still very much finding my feet with blogging - still thinking about whether to stick with blogger or switch to wordpress, what my real topics should be about, whether this is the right blogname or whether I should switch to something more anonymous etc. I added the wordpress daily post challenge to my rss reader, without intending to necessarily pick up each of the slightly random topic suggestions but in the hope it'll keep me a bit inspired. 

And so a recent suggestion was 'three things you can do to be a better friend to the people in your life'. Since work got less crazy, I have been making a real effort to be a better friend, and so I think the three things that I will try to do are

- reach out and check in more often - which might mean several times a week for close friends, or maybe a bigger 'getting-back-in-touch' drive with people I like but have let slip away. And I'm going to try to make some progress through my huge stash of cards and postcards too...

- propose things to do rather than waiting for others to have ideas - and try to go beyond 'let's go for a drink', to include late night gallery opening, theatre and (cheap) dinner, and keep on inviting people back to mine.

- keep on being friends with the man. We're really good, great mates in both senses of the word and I want to keep it that way, to keep on enjoying each others' company, thoughts, ideas and brains as well as being lovers, and housemates.

Entertaining weekend

Lovely afternoon yesterday with book group girls - it's been running 3 years so we celebrated with pink fizz and a fantastic spread of savouries and cakes. Everyone had enjoyed The Help - and it's been a while since I've really enjoyed a book club selection so it's nice to be getting back into it. Talking on the phone to Mum she'd enjoyed it and found it provoked a lot of thinking for her - although interesting not about apartheid South Africa which I'd expected.

And today a really lazy start with a big lie-in, breakfast and papers and then I rustled up some cake before Bruce and Carmel came over for a neighbourly return match to compare house layout and damp problems, drink mulled wine and coffee and eat said coffee and walnut treat. Carmel's brilliant on local history - including where the bombs dropped, famous people who live/have lived around here, and the Tudor history of Greenwich, Blackheath, Eltham etc. I'm really enjoying feeling like part of a street and making the choice to get to know people. Am hoping to find a scrabble player somewhere near here...

Now it's time to get ready for Zen.

Dorkiness in the evening

So I finished work on time (yay), went to Waterloo for coffee with Caz - a lovely treat and more importantly a chance to hand back her phone which I've had for more than a week. We've fixed a date for dinner next month and it feels good to be seeing each other more regularly. Funny that something as basic as her monthly teaching session gives us the structure we need to see each other and makes it a lot easier than when we have to pick up the phone and pluck a date from thin air.

This evening I raced through the last 50 pages or so of The Help, and since then I've been updating my LibraryThing - utter dorkiness, but so satisfying to go through a few hundred books and tag them with things that will help me find and remember them. And to realise I've been reading the Booker shortlist since 2005 which does make me ancient. Now about to upload some photos, then into the bath with book No.3 of the year...

Busy day

Breakfast at Nevada Cafe with James and Katee and sharing the magic of emoji . Then off for a cuppa, fancy biscuits and chat with Gaz and Kelly and nearly-two Freya. Amazingly cute, lovely ginger curls and so good at jigsaws and picnics. Then on to Si and Laura for another cuppa and cuddle with sleepy George. On to Di's to get her email working and now on the M25 home.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Day of Doom

So, the morning after the night before. Actually, the whole day after the night before. Not so pretty. Mumbling, stumbling, whimpering and sleeping. Finally started to perk up about 4pm. Major achievement of the day - finishing Damages Series 3 with a 5 episode marathon. Thanks due to Adam for clearing up dinner and empties from last night and looking after Kat and Liam (and to Kat for getting up to say bye to Caz at 7.30am)