We brave the morning cold to queue at the National Theatre,arriving about eight, which puts us near but not at the front of the queue. It's cold - around zero - but not windy and we're in a particularly sheltered bit. Chat for the hour and some with the man behind us - theatre, travel, politics, education - and the time passes quite quickly. He's here to get tickets for "this House" and we for Alan Bennett's "People". Early queuers can get two tickets each from the £12 tickets held back for same day release, and belatedly it occurs to us that we can get two tickets for one play for the matinée this afternoon and two more for tonight`s performance. So we do.
Quick trip home for late breakfast and then back for the afternoon. London always so visually stimulating. Opposite us on the tube sits a young man wearing black leather jacket, white dress shirt, bow tie showing a map of the underground, red tartan vest, black jeans rolled up to the length of plus fours, heavy woollen socks meeting his trousers, and platform shoes that are a combination of leopard spots, black spots on white and black spots on dark red. En route to a party? Maybe, but his female companion is dressed quite conventionally.
“This House`is our matinée choice. Brilliantly staged, fast paced and fun. It follows the finely balanced and sometimes minority British parliaments of the mid-seventies, focused entirely on the Labour and Tory whips and set mostly in the whips’ rooms. The only character we actually recognise is a young Michael Heseltine swinging the mace to the incandescent fury of the speaker (as he actually did in 1976). But that is the point. The drama and chaos of the whips’ offices always is much of the story, despite having protagonists whose names no one later remembers.
There’s not really time to go home between plays, so a quick burger and we take coffees from Starbucks back to the National where there’s a jazz trio performing in he foyer. The singer is very good and it’s a lovely way to spend the time before the evening performance. “People” is also enjoyable. Not absolutely prime Bennett, but some wit and some interesting questions. It takes us a while to recognise the female archdeacon as Selina Cadell, who plays the pharmacist in Doc Martin. Not recognition based on memory, either. We google on the Blackberry tablet during the interval.
A long day, but fun.
Quick trip home for late breakfast and then back for the afternoon. London always so visually stimulating. Opposite us on the tube sits a young man wearing black leather jacket, white dress shirt, bow tie showing a map of the underground, red tartan vest, black jeans rolled up to the length of plus fours, heavy woollen socks meeting his trousers, and platform shoes that are a combination of leopard spots, black spots on white and black spots on dark red. En route to a party? Maybe, but his female companion is dressed quite conventionally.
“This House`is our matinée choice. Brilliantly staged, fast paced and fun. It follows the finely balanced and sometimes minority British parliaments of the mid-seventies, focused entirely on the Labour and Tory whips and set mostly in the whips’ rooms. The only character we actually recognise is a young Michael Heseltine swinging the mace to the incandescent fury of the speaker (as he actually did in 1976). But that is the point. The drama and chaos of the whips’ offices always is much of the story, despite having protagonists whose names no one later remembers.
There’s not really time to go home between plays, so a quick burger and we take coffees from Starbucks back to the National where there’s a jazz trio performing in he foyer. The singer is very good and it’s a lovely way to spend the time before the evening performance. “People” is also enjoyable. Not absolutely prime Bennett, but some wit and some interesting questions. It takes us a while to recognise the female archdeacon as Selina Cadell, who plays the pharmacist in Doc Martin. Not recognition based on memory, either. We google on the Blackberry tablet during the interval.
A long day, but fun.
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