2015

Wassuuuuuup. Happy 2015! I was going to wait to do a hello again post until after I’d caught up with all my reviewing, but to be honest that day may never come (see list below). So here I am. Still alive, still pigging about in south London and you know, various theatres. However, I have some news. From mid-April this year I will be trotting myself back up to my homeland of the north (Newcastle, to be precise) to live there instead of here. I won’t technically be a Brixpig any longer (even though now I’m really a Hernepig anyway), and I’m not sure what I’ll do about this blog. I’ll probably carry on. I’ll let ya know.

 

In the meantime, I am planning to massively enjoy my last few months in our fair capital. I spent New Year’s Eve at my friend’s lovely boarding school in Banbury, drinking half pints of prosecco in the common room and dancing round tables, eating excessive amounts of carrot sticks and dicking about with sparklers. And this year I have already seen some stupendous theatre, eaten a load of leftover Christmas cheese, discovered Magic FM’s new Sunday evening radio show starring John Barrowman (you know you want to), and eaten more bags of Mini Eggs than I care to think about.

 

Music-wise, I am still loving Bleachers who I get to see in February (yesssss), and HIGHLY recommend Marina and the Diamonds’s new stuff – she is releasing one new song a month until the Froot album release in April and I can confirm that they are all brilliant so far (particularly Immortal). And in my traditional style, I’m about six months behind the rest of the world and have just discovered how amazing Sia is. I am obsessed with her album. This video of her new single Elastic Heart is amazing (and features Maddie from Dance Moms – who knew my mother’s TV viewing was actually on trend?).

 

 

Telly-wise, I’m catching up with new episodes of Girls and Glee (both underwhelming but I’m sticking with them), and undertook the perhaps unwise feat of watching series 1 and 2 of Broadchurch simultaneously. I have now seen the whole of series 1 so can rumble along with the rest of the nation from this point on – so glad to see Eve Myles back on my screen, she is a cracker. Episodes is also back in the US (and therefore online…) and is on top form so far – Greig, Mangan and le Blanc are a dream trio. Final recommendation is Catastrophe, which started a couple of weeks ago on channel 4 and is fucking hilarious – just watch it and I guarantee you’ll be laughing out loud.

COMING UP IN 2015:
The Changeling at the Wanamaker
How to Hold Your Breath at the Royal Court (Maxine Peake!)
London Gin Festival
Bleachers at Bush Hall
Stevie at Hampstead Theatre (Zoe Wanamaker!)
Antigone at the Barbican (Juliette Binoche!)
The Broken Heart at the Wanamaker
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown at the Playhouse (Tamsin Greig!)
Sweeney Todd at the Coliseum (Emma Thompson!!)
Fleetwood Mac again in Leeds (Christine McVie!)

 

And when I finally get my writing shit together, here is what you can expect to see, reviews-wise:
‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore
Kylie
Electra
Urinetown
The Crucible
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
Chrissie Hynde
Edward Scissorhands
Elephants
Made in Dagenham
(Can you see why it takes me so long??)

 

Lovely to be back.

 

Brixpig x

Lena Dunham: Not That Kind of Girl book tour

When: Friday 31st October

 

Where: Royal Festival Hall

 

Why: Dunham + Moran = Dream Team

 

“There’s nothing I love more than a swearing woman.” Lena, I am so on board. And I should have utilised my well-worn cursing skills on the grumpy man sat next to me in an otherwise buzzy twittering excited audience of people with fantastic taste (and great booking skills – the show sold out in about 12 hours apparently). Grumpy man had clearly been dragged along by his girlfriend, who spent the rest of the show appeasing and stroking him – slightly not in the spirit of an evening of strident feminism, but never mind. The rest of the audience were on form, and the crowd included even more exciting people such as Sandi Toksvig, Sarah Millican, Richard E Grant and the cast of Call the Midwife (MIRANDA!). I was in good company despite being there (obviously) by myself (as is my wont).

 

The legendary Caitlin Moran introduced Lena, and after a reading from her new book, they settled down together for a chat and some top banter. They’re both inherently hilarious people, and I hadn’t just laughed out loud so much for ages. At the same time they are hugely inspiring and empowering, not only because of all their combined hugely impressive showbiz achievements, but also because they were just chatting normally and openly about life and issues and funny shit that happens. I love Girls, Lena’s much lauded TV show, but don’t massively relate to it much personally. For me it was much easier to connect to what she was saying in a chat format, and later on in her book as I ploughed through it on the bus home. I literally felt lucky to be there and made sure I’d switched on my wisdom absorbers to full beam.

 

The discussion swooped over a variety of topics, and most prevalent were issues of representation and just attempting to exist successfully in a judgmental world. As Lena put it:
“2014 has been about the power of saying no. For women no is not a word we are taught to say enough. There is a sense that you have to be amenable and pleasing and when you're a successful women you feel you have to apologise for it. Setting boundaries is the only thing that allows us to keep going on and keep our light on.”

 

I also loved a piece of advice from her father that Lena shared: “Fear isn’t what keeps the plane in the air.” She added, “… that was what made me think that actually, by worrying, we can’t prevent what’s challenging. All the things that have really thrown me, have been the things that I have not thought to worry about.” Which I immediately identify with. Another Dunham prescription for anxiety is just having a sleep. More sound advice, particularly when combined with the revelation that she owns more pyjamas than clothes. Oh god me too.

 

Fantastic and hilarious evening in the presence of a couple of thousand excellent people and two in particular. Not That Kind of Girl is definitely worth reading (if nothing else it will make you feel comparatively sane) and I will treasure my signed copy.

 

Brixpig x

When: Saturday 11th October

Where: Hackney Picturehouse

Why: Ongoing Moomin love

I had no idea I was going to the UK premiere of the brand new Moomin movie – like Little My I bounded way too excitedly into a surprising adventure! The movie was an absolute cracker and deserves to be popular for years to come. It features the bohemian, supremely chillaxed Moomin family and various friends heading off to the French Riviera for a holiday escapade. Their innocence leads them into some beautiful scrapes (the Snork Maiden yearning for a tiny bikini was gorgeously sweet), and while the more inherently glamorous Moominpappa and Snork Maiden revel in the delights of the Riviera, it soon becomes too much for Mamma and Moomintroll, and tensions ensue. In the end, all is made right by a herd of sand-carved elephants and some good old-fashioned rebellion. The values of equality and simplicity win out, as always in the Moomins' world.

The whole cast of this English version of the film were in attendance at the screening, including the hilariously absent-minded director who seemed to not quite grasp the concept of a Q&A session, and the divine Russell Tovey who voiced Moomintroll. Also in attendance was Sophia Jansson, niece of Tove Jansson (creator of the Moomins) and whose childhood features in Jansson’s novel The Summer Book. My friends failed to stop me being a massive nerd when I said that I had to go and speak to her after the movie, just to say how much Tove’s creations mean to me. She responded kindly and with a little Scandinavian bemusement at such wild over-enthusiasm, but I’m glad I spoke to her. Definitely my geekiest moment of 2014.

Enjoy them here:

Brixpig x

Kate Bush: Before the Dawn

When: Tuesday 23rd September

Where: Hammersmith Apollo

Why: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“Oh it’s gonna be the way you always dreamed about it, but it’s gonna be really happening to you.”

Even as I was sitting in my terribly-far-back seat, next to my best friend with our faces painted in Babooshka style and our hair massively backcombed, downing rosé to simultaneously calm myself and hype myself up, I still couldn’t quite believe that I was about to see Kate Bush live. The whole audience seemed strangely tense, as was I – as tense as I had been months before, when I couldn’t sleep for fear I wouldn’t be able to bag tickets when they went on sale the next morning. And then – the incantation from Lily began – “Oh thou, who givest sustenance to the universe…” And on she stomped, leading her entourage like a barefooted, black-gowned pied piper of madness. The rest is honestly a blur. But the best blur of my life. 

The whole evening was madly theatrical: the name of the show (Before the Dawn) appeared above the entrance to the Apollo, not her own name. The first six songs formed a more traditionally gig-like section, like the most insane warm-up you could imagine – and although Hounds of Love is one of my all-time favourite songs, I was concentrating far too hard on absorbing every second of it to fully enjoy it, and it’s the soaring, staggering King of the Mountain that stays in my mind as just literally mind-blowing. 

The Ninth Wave, staged somewhere within a shipwreck and a whale’s ribcage, floating on the sea and under the ice, was ridiculous; assaulting the senses and making you feel like you’d been tossed over waves of adrenaline and shipwrecked somewhere in Hammersmith. Featuring scary fish people, a helicopter with searchlights zooming around the audience, poetic confetti cannons, a floating buoy and a skit with heavy emphasis on burnt sausages, it was enrapturing and immersive. Bush didn’t dance as such over the course of the evening, but the whole thing was still undeniably physical and she was all over the shop while staying note-perfect and sounding just like herself. Concluding with The Morning Fog was a joyous celebration of all on stage being together and restored, and this translated to the happily swaying audience who seemed frankly relieved to have survived.

After a stunned and giddy interval (us not her), A Sky of Honey was soothing and a balm to the senses (and thankfully the Rolf Harris part was beautifully replaced by Bush’s son Bertie), and featured gorgeous lighting effects and projections of birds that I wish I could have playing constantly in the background of my life. Just everywhere I go. The pace increases towards the end, becomes dramatic and almost brutal – a tree slams straight through the grand piano, causing whoops and gasps – and in true dramatic Kate fashion, she metamorphs into a black winged bird to bring the piece to a close. “All of the birds are laughing… Come on let’s all join in…”

Kate herself seemed on the toppest form – engaging and charming, betraying not a jot of her previous famous stage nerves. She was quirky and confident, understated but accessibly cool. You literally wanted to be up there with her, flapping about on the stage, throwing your shoes into the lake and running up that hill. She ended on the incredible Cloudbusting to my huge joy, and after the most deserving of standing ovations we continued shrieking long after we’d run out of the Apollo and into the night. 

Brixpig x