A trip to London

[wellinghall]

Yesterday, we went to London for a day of culture. The afternoon was spent at the Palace Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue, watching Monty Python's Spamalot. Very enjoyable. Very silly - in fact, at first I thought it was rather too silly, but I soon got into it (coincidentally, around the time the dancing girls came on stage ;-) ) - and great fun. Someone who knew more of the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail might have appreciated it even more.

The Lady of the Lake was played by an understudy, but she did very well. I was confused for a while, because we were using a programme from Creatrix's mother, which listed Tim Curry in the cast; I kept looking out for him, without realising that he had now been replaced by Simon Russell Beale.

Then dinner in the crypt of St-Martins-in-the-built-up-area - lamb steak in red wine sauce, chicken with papaya and salad for Creatrix. And then onto the London Coliseum for The Marriage of Figaro. Again very enjoyable, although I think Creatrix (who is the opera buff* in this household) got more out of it than I did. To my taste, it went on about half an hour too long, and I was occasionally confused as to just who knew what about whose secret identity. Otherwise, the staging, costumes and direction were magnificent; and I did appreciate the surtitles (even when they differed slightly from the words actually being sung!)

There were only two downsides to the day. The first was the rapacious attitude of the theatres. At the Palace, we were charged £10.50 for one (1) glass of wine, one (1) orange juice, and one (1) packet of nuts. At the Coliseum, a programme was £4.50!

The second was the transport. We got to King's Cross Thameslink on the way in to find that there were no Northern or Picadilly line trains running from there. On the way back, our first taxi was snaffled by someone else; we got a stopping train back; and then had to get a taxi from Luton, due to engineering works. All this contrived to keep us out until midnight; and a Wellinghall needs his sleep!

Oh, and a third was that my week at work kept spilling over into my thoughts.

Today, a lie-in, and then various bits of cooking, sewing, reading &c. We need to clean the bird feeders, then we'll be going for a walk and a swim. I've also got emails and LJ comments to reply to.

*Geddit? - opera buff - opera buffa - no? - oh well, please yourselves.

Comments

[the-marquis.livejournal.com]

He,he,he at the opera buff gag.
I was occasionally confused as to just who knew what about whose secret identity. Otherwise, the staging, costumes and direction was magnificent; and I did appreciate the surtitles (even when they differed slightly from the words actually being sung!)

Ah yes I know those feelings, it is worse though when the singing is in Italian and the surtitles in German and one isn't fluent in either! :D

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Yes, at least I could follow most of the action!

[emily-shore.livejournal.com]

Sounds like quite a trip! London is always expensive, exciting and tiring in equal measures. I love visiting but it's always a relief to get home again.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Indeed; and I am definitely looking to a nice, quiet couple of days at home next weekend.

[didiusjulianus.livejournal.com]

You can't please some people!

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Au contraire - I enjoyed the day out in London, and now I'm looking forward to a quiet weekend at home. Easily pleased, me ;-)

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Crikey - Spamalot and Figaro in a single day! I adore Figaro, and fortuantely have seen it enough times never to need to buy a rip-off programme again, but do spend much of the fourth act in the garden and the interminable third act dancing wishing they'd cut a bit of it.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

We live just far enough from London that we thought it was worth doing two shows in one day, to make the most of the travel time and cost. And I think we were right; we didn't really suffer from "culture overload".

The Figaro programme is at least reasonably interesting, with some fairly heavyweight articles in (and my friend's name, yay! - she works at the ENO). The Spamalot programme was just "Dese are de actors, dese are de scenes, dese are some adverts".

It was the fourth act when it started to pall on me; not helped by the fact that they were running about fifteen minutes over the time stated in the programme, and I didn't realise this, so I thought it was due to end about the time they entered the garden.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

not helped by the fact that they were running about fifteen minutes over the time stated in the programme, and I didn't realise this, so I thought it was due to end about the time they entered the garden.
Ah. That doens't happen to me, largely because wondering which train I'll be able to get home has made me a bit of a clockwatcher!

(And good to have a Spamalot rec, have been wondering whether it's worth it).

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

It is.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Mind if I friend you, BTW?

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

Please do!

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Done! ;-)

[chainmailmaiden]

The prices for food and drink at the Coliseum are pretty steep too. I think we got 10p change out of a tenner when we bought 2 not particularly large sandwiches one time. *tries not to think about the cost of the half bottle of champagne we drank with them*

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

The previous time we were there, I had an orange juice, which was pricy although probably not above normal central London levels. Not that I drink in central London theatres (or, indeed, any theatres) often enough to have a good idea of the typical scale of charges; and what just has to look at what the local cinema charges to know that rip-offs are the order of the day.

[chainmailmaiden]

Rip-offs definitely abound in central London. The reason we often drink champagne on the rare occasions we do go out is that Bacchus argues that the mark-up on champagne and other sparking wines is usually far less than that for other wines. He'd rather pay a bit more and get a better wine, than be fleeced for stuff we wouldn't even deign to mull at home.

If he's happy to pay for it, I'm happy to drink it :-)

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

That's worth knowing; thanks.

[psychostace.livejournal.com]

I adore the Holy Grail! Keep meaning to go and see Spamalot. My boss said it was fantastic.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

I can certainly recommend it.