Dick Twittington 50: Justifiable homicide

This week on my Twitter feed, I get cryptic.

There's a busker outside Waitrose. But he's a busker playing jazz on a baby grand piano because, like I say: Waitrose.
RETWEETS 2
2:37 PM - 19 Feb 2014

I think the *other* jug-eared Big Favourite Round These Parts might ride on our bus, too #cryptic #cassio
6:44 PM - 19 Feb 2014

If Brookstein ever gets cancer, remind me to describe it as "lazy flu."
9:01 AM - 20 Feb 2014

Dick Twittington 49: Dumbed down for the likes of you

This week on my Twitter feed, the words "rail replacement bus service" haunt my nightmares.

JULIE ATHERTON KLAXON http://shar.es/Q8YnU
10:57 AM - 12 Feb 2014

Dolly's new album cover was designed by Billy from The Kitchen Sink. http://twitpic.com/dvaunf
3:47 PM - 12 Feb 2014

What I'm most looking forward to about Mr Burns: Finding out why it's called Mr Burns if it's about a Sideshow Bob episode.
1:27 PM - 13 Feb 2014

Book review: Brenda & Effie Forever!

Another Brenda & Effie novel by Paul Magrs, there's a lot of hints being dropped that Brenda & Effie Forever! might be the final book in the series. Brenda, the Bride of Frankenstein and Whitby B&B owner, and her best friend Effie, the last in a line of powerful witches who now runs an antique shop, start off on holiday in Paris where they bump into their local equivalents M Ananas and M Banane (aka Mr Pineapple and Mr Banana, or the Phantom of the Opera and the Hunchback of Notre Dame.) They warn them about great danger if they return home, which is of course exactly what they get.

The story sees the two old ladies and their friends encounter the ghosts of the Brontë sisters, who now run an underground (literally) school of magic and jujitsu, and I thought it took a while to get as quirkily funny as some of the earlier books in the series, but by the second half of the book there's plenty of bizarre little observations that had me chuckling. As for whether this is the final Brenda & Effie volume, it seems to me as if Magrs left the ending open enough that he could call it a day if he wanted, or bring the pair back if he decided he had more stories to tell. For me there's a few too many loose ends left to call this a conclusive ending - I want to know about the dust, for one thing.

Dick Twittington 48: Your Mum

This week on my Twitter feed there's a Tube strike, some gubbins about theatre and TV, and gratuitous Robert Lonsdale nipples, because that's the sort of thing I do to pass the time.

I'm worried that my journey into work this morning was relatively straightforward, & I'm being softened up for Hull on Earth on the way back
1:08 PM - 5 Feb 2014

Yay Eve Best confirmed! I mean, even Kathryn Hunter couldn't make Antony & Cleopatra bearable to me, but better with Eve Best than without.
3:08 PM - 5 Feb 2014


That's weird, I was only wondering the other day when Pig! No Pig! would resurface http://shar.es/QGdpH
11:30 AM - 6 Feb 2014

8th Bloggieversary

Not that I have much to say in these any more but for the record... I've been blogging on one platform or other for eight years now, and I've even splintered off from one Livejournal to two different blogs. Partially Obstructed View, in which I say far too much about theatre, and this one, in which I say very little about anything any more. So off I go to continue doing just that.

Book review: Gone Girl

Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl seemed to be the book to be seen reading on the Tube last year, so just to be awkward I've waited until this year to catch up with it. It does turn out to deserve its popularity though: Amy goes missing on her five-year wedding anniversary, and her husband Nick is the obvious suspect. The story is told alternately through the point of view of the couple, Nick's chapters starting from the day of her disappearance so we see a couple who are being slowly pulled apart by financial problems, and Amy's going back to their first meeting, so we see a more hopeful time and what brought them together. As Nick protests his innocence both to the police and the readers, evidence against him seems to mount up.

But the book then takes a surprise flip into a different direction altogether, with further twists along the way, which means there's not much more I can say about it without spoiling it. But Flynn presents the various red herrings and fakeouts with such conviction the book turns out to be gripping and really effective.

Dick Twittington 47: "Ur nuuuuur!"

This week on my Twitter feed: A cat photo, because it's internet law that I post at least two a year.

At risk of self-parody but I don't fancy anyone in the Swan's summer ensemble and now I don't know what to think http://www.rsc.org.uk/whats-on/the-roaring-girl/cast.aspx
3:25 PM - 29 Jan 2014

Damn, I can't make this. Still, Tom Wells klaxon: http://www.arcolatheatre.com/events/outbox-snapshots
RETWEET 1 FAVORITE 1
4:48 PM - 29 Jan 2014

I mean.... *technically* I could rush across London after King Lear...
4:49 PM - 29 Jan 2014