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‘Canary’ comes to Brighton

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Canary, a play by Jonathan Harvey, the award-winning writer of Beautiful Thing and Gimme Gimme Gimme, is coming to the Brighton Little Theatre on Saturday, March 2-Saturday, March 9.

Set in 1960s Liverpool, Tom and Billy hide their love in the closet, then go their separate ways. As pits close and the dole queues grow, Mickey and Russell escape to Heaven in 1980s London. But today the paparazzi turn judge and jury over a love story that could tear this family apart.

Directed by Steven Adams, the play tells the story of recent gay history from illegal sexual encounters in the 1960s via the Gay Liberation Front movement of the 1970s, AIDS in the 1980s, to closeted public figures and homophobic attacks.

Tickets £9.00 (inc booking fee) from http://brightonlittletheatre.ticketline.co.uk/canary

Explaining why he has brought Canary to Brighton, director Stephen Adams says:

“Gay people have it easy now, we have civil partnerships, an equal age of consent and civil liberties. So why put on a gay play? This was the question I was asked, and I asked myself, when I put forward to direct this play.

Three years ago I directed Beautiful Thing, Jonathan Harvey’s tale of young love and coming out, and at the time some people thought that it was now a period piece and that there were no longer any issues with being gay and coming out. But I think that gay people still have a way to go until we achieve full equality and have the same respect in society that straight people take for granted.

Living in Brighton we become immune to the problems that people face outside our little enlightened bohemia. In many parts of the world gay people are still criminalised, imprisoned, persecuted and even executed just because of their sexuality. Even with the Arab Spring gay rights are not being adopted in these newly “liberated” countries.

In Russia and the former Eastern Block countries of Europe gay rights are being suppressed and gay pride protests are declared illegal and cracked down on by the police. Even here and in Western Europe and America we face the struggle for gay marriage to be legalised and our relationships to be seen on an equal par with straight ones.

Gay people still find it hard to be themselves without fear of violence and ridicule within their communities in parts of the UK. Homophobic attacks, including murders, have been on the increase in recent years and the bullying of students considered to be gay has resulted in suicides in both the UK and the US. Just earlier this year two friends of mine were beaten up late at night in safe and accepting Brighton, just for holding hands in the street.
It continues to be hard to come out to your families and friends and always will do whilst there is shame and stigma attached to being gay. So yes, we have come a long way but we also have some way to go. That’s why I thought it was important to stage Canary.

It details the struggles that gay people have gone through over the last 50 years and the struggles they encounter today.

It is important to remind ourselves of the past and reflect on the achievements that have been made whilst acknowledging the issues we still face. This will be the amateur premiere of the play and I think that if no other amateur group felt able to put it on, then one in Brighton definitely should!

But Canary is far from a dry issues play, Jonathan Harvey has written a great character-led piece that veers between high drama and camp comedy. As well as a tragic tale of lives led in secret, gay conversions therapies and the high toll that AIDS inflicted.

Expect cross dressing teenage boys, policemen caught with their trousers down, high kicking nuns and star turns from Mary Whitehouse and Margaret Thatcher!

It’s a deeply moving, funny, uplifting and magical play. Do not go gently. Do not keep silent. Because one day we’ll all be tulips”.

Haunted by you: Rachael Sage: Album Review

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Rachel Sage has a new album out – her 10th– and on the strength of the few review tracks she’s released it’s gonna be a good one.  Sage is a poet with a guitar, inherited; like a lot of her metaphorical pain and pure lyrical genius from her ex.

Her deceptively simple hum along feel good melodies hide some dark hidden depths and her breathy voice seduces the time away when listening to her lyrics which are heartbreakingly honest with a relentless streak of optimistic hope.

See her sing  Abby would you wait for me  here:

rs_bernstein2_hiShe’s playing in my car at the moment the perfect accompaniment to a long drive home and her music just grows on you, what seems a uncomplicated song really blossoms into something with great warmth. She’s a find.  She was Café Nero’s artist of the month late last year so you may have heard her singing along while you were sipping Lattes and wondering why love never works out for you.

She has shared stages with Sarah McLachlan, Judy Collins, Marc Cohn, The Animals and Ani DiFranco, and was named one of the Top 100 Independent Artists Of The Past 15 Years by Performing Songwriter magazine. Her performances combine musicianship with between-song banter, what The New York Times recently dubbed Sage’s “inner Fanny Brice”

If you don’t know Sage, then keep up poppet, check her out, she’s touring the UK at the moment with Sadie and the Hotheads and releases her new album on 24th February, and I’d recommend getting along to see her and having a good old fashioned night out with a musician at ease with her music and with the rare ability to tease a tiny crack in your heart and poor her feelings into it, and leave you smiling and humming her songs on the way home.

 

For more information about Rachel, click here:

 

Back to Bach in March

WEB.220Back to Bach, a night of Baroque Music, takes  place at The Unitarian Church, New Road, Brighton on March 9 at 7.30pm.

Baroque flautist, Robert Goodman and harpsichordist, Massimo Redaelli will perform Bach’s  ‘English’ Suites BWV 707 & 808, Partita BWV 830 and the Sonata for flauto traversiere and cembala obbligato BWV 1030.

Tickets: £7 (£5 concs) on the door or by calling 01273 603459.

For more info, click here:

Hove MP joins powerful select committee

Mike Weatherley
Mike Weatherley

Mike Weatherley, the Conservative MP for Hove and Portslade, has joined the powerful House of Commons Justice Select Committee. The Justice Committee was appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of the Ministry of Justice and associated public bodies.

Mike has worked closely with the Ministry of Justice since his election to Parliament, particularly in his role in securing legislation for squatting to be criminalised in residential premises and his work with the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Retail Crime.

Mike said:

“I am honoured to serve on the Justice Select Committee. The oversight carried out by committees such as this is just one of the important roles that MPs undertake in order to instil public confidence in our national institutions. I look forward to working with this group of cross-party colleagues as it carries out its scrutiny role.” 

Subline raises £800 for charity

 

Subline staff & Wilma Fingadoo
Subline staff & Wilma Fingadoo

On Saturday February 16, the staff at Subline in St James Street, organised their first Big Staff Auction. Eight members of staff were auctioned off to the highest bidder by auctioneer Wilma Fingadoo. The winner of each ‘lot’ won a meal for 2 with their ‘prize’ at one of seven venues across the city.

With the bids, donations and a collection bucket on the door the event raised an amazing £800 to be split equally between THT and the Sussex Beacon.

Subline Manager, Steve, send his thanks to all those who came on the night to bid in the auction and support the (extremely nervous) bar staff.

He said:

“We weren’t sure how this event would go, but it ended up being a huge success. We hope to roll this out as an even bigger event in the future”.

“Thanks must go to the venues who donated meals for the winners; The Chilli Pickle, The Camelford Arms, The Bedford Tavern, Oregano’s, 112 Church Street, Harvester and Smokey’s. We’re also really thankful to Andy Tull for his generous cash donation, as well as those who supported us with the extra technical equipment used.”

“We hope that the winners will enjoy their meal and that those who got out-bid will search the back of their sofa before the next event”.

Just Good Friends in Hove

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Just Good Friends, a cabaret-style show of material by composer and lyricist Mark Bunyan, will be playing at The Purple Playhouse in Hove on Friday, March 8 – Sunday, March 10 at 7.30pm.

Directed by Johnnie Worthy, and starring Mark Bunyan, Kate Dyson and Mark Inscoe, the show takes a contemporary look at love, and is a compilation of songs to make you laugh and cry, with a few risqué numbers added to the mix.

Tickets are £7 on the door

Or telephone: 01273 207055 to reserve them in advance.

Where: The Purple Playhouse, 36 Montefiore Road, Hove, BN3 6EP.

For more info, click here:

Predator of Soho finally barred by unique ASBO ruling

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Charles Omishore

A thief who preyed on the gay community in Soho for more than a decade has been banned from every public toilet in central London in an ASBO ruling thought to be the first of its kind.

Westminster City Council, with the support of the Metropolitan Police, is thought to be the first authority in England to gain such a court order. It means that Charles Omishore, 32, is banned from the entire West End and a central part of Camden for the next five years and specifically cannot enter public toilets in the area.

Westminster Magistrates’ Court granted the order after hearing about a string of offences in which Omishore typically pick-pocketed his male victims while engaging in sexual activity and then making off with wallets, mobile phones and other valuables.

The court heard that Omishore routinely targeted men in Soho bars, public toilets and the rose garden in Hyde Park.

In total Omishore has 22 convictions dating back more than 10 years for a range of offences including theft, fraud, drugs and bail offences. He has been convicted for possession of drugs including crack cocaine and heroin and has been arrested several times for smoking crack in public telephone boxes in central London.

Westminster Council’s cabinet member for community protection, Cllr Nickie Aiken, said:

“We suspect Omishore has been getting away with this for so long because his victims have been reluctant to come forward and report attacks and thefts. A crime is a crime, and victims should feel they are able to report it, whatever the circumstances. 

“Our landmark ASBO finally rids central London of this predatory offender, and we will continue to take a zero-tolerance approach to theft, drug use and intimidating behaviour in the West End.”

Westminster City Council’s crime reduction team and the Soho Safer Neighbourhood Team are now circulating public awareness posters around the West End with photos and information about Omishore, warning people to call the police immediately if they spot him in the exclusion zone.

Chief Inspector Kevin Hobson, responsible for policing and business in the West End, said:

“We are grateful to the people and business of Soho who have helped secure the criminal convictions and ASBO that bans this evil criminal from our community. 

“The impact on victims from such crimes is immeasurable and to those who have come forward to help the investigations in the past we again offer our sincere thanks and support.” 

Peer Action Quiz Night

WEB.600Volunteers at Peer Action, the HIV charity for those affected by HIV are organising a ‘Bounce into Spring’ quiz night at St. George’s Crypt Community Centre in Upper Kemptown on Saturday, March 16 at 7.30pm

The quiz host for the evening is Adam, the esteemed landlady from the Bedford Tavern.

Food and drink will be provided, making the tickets, at £5 each, a real bargain. There will be a raffle and a £50 cash prize for the winning quiz team.

Tickets are on sale at the Peer Action website: 

Everyone is welcome – friends, partners, spring chickens – see you all there!

’13 Women’ celebrate International Women’s Day

A4 poster MASTERv6.inddFollowing the success of the ’13 Women’ exhibition staged by I Love Art UK in Brighton during 2012, this popular event returns to the Jubilee Library to coincide with International Women’s Day.

This year as well as 13 female artists, the exhibition also features 13 men!

With the theme of ‘Transition’, the 2013 event will have an extended line-up encompassing international artists, as well as the 13 male participants.

The show runs at the Jubilee Library in Brighton from March, 1-15, 2013.

An open evening to coincide with ‘International Woman’s Day’ will be hosted on March 8, 2013 from 8.00pm-10.30pm

All works presented will be available for sale – either as originals or affordable prints.

The 2012 inaugural run of ‘13 Women’ attracted more than 42,000 visitors.

The 2013 event takes place from 10:00am-5:00pm on March 1-15, 2013, at Brighton Jubilee Library, Jubilee Square, BN1. Entry is FREE.

Medea. ENO. Opera review

Extra MedeaMedea. Marc-Antoine Charpentie.

ENO’s new production of Medea directed by David McVicar  opened to a packed house at the ENO last night and was thrilling and engaging from the off. This most complicated of Greek myths was presented with a fresh perspective and allowed the much maligned Medea to convince us of her terrible vengeance. It was gripping, absorbing and shocking too.

Following Castor and Pollux, the English National Opera has began a revision of French baroque music and has allowed lost classics to be given new opportunity to shine, this new production of Medea is dynamic, spirited and gripping. You can read the synopsis here:

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Sarah Connolly’s Medea is dark, convincing, powerful and utterly convincing. Her plunge from the tenderness of love, to abandonment and scorn rising to nuclear rage is a tour de force and was transfixing.  From tender mother to arm slashing sorceress she is magnificent, her fury sensually blinding, her betrayal compelling. Jeffrey Francis’s treacherous manipulating Jason is dull but sung well, he never convinced me he was a hero worthy of passionate love. Roderick William as Orontes was superb filling the role and auditorium with his resonate power.

Katherine Manley and Brindley Sherratt as father and daughter Creon and Creusa are a great pairing, making us uncomfortable in their suggestion of incestuous obsession. Sherratt’s tumbling, grasping trousers dropping desperation as he’s is driven mad by the summoned daemons a moment of humiliating horror.

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Lynne Page has managed to choreography something with the dancers which fills the demands for French fru fru filling without jarring with the action. The poly-morphously perverse daemons and lithe leaping Sailors were fun and dance with panache, although there were moments where they could have been a little tighter. The full house was delighted by their first cheekily camp appearance. The resulting bump & grind/ rococo twirling mash-up meshes well and gets progressively darker reflecting the general tone of denial.

The costumes and vaguely French chateau set (by Bunny Christie) pulled from some uptight 1940’s, all neat tailoring and rolled bun hair, clean military tailoring and muted colours are sufficient to set the atmosphere of the times, a society on a war footing, status and purpose trembling on the edge of sensual abandonment as death is ever present. The dark and muted colour palate highlight Creusa’s shimmering dress of death and Medea’s own power suited presence.

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There are hints of the movies (particularly Cupids entry in a red glittery Spitfire), of court life being a performance allowing the rather rococo demands of movements and action to be slotted into a world of hierarchy and deferment and the lighting –  Paule Constable- was brilliant this evening,  picking out details, masking motive, highlighting action and bathing the chorus in the kind of attention they deserve. I was thrilled by it.  The translation from Christopher Cowell was good, although sometimes pedestrian oddly avoiding any tie in with the suggested 1940’d period.

 

See Sarah Connolly sing ‘Such is the price of love’ from Medea here:

medeaCarpenter’s music has few great set pieces but rather it ebbs, flows & floods and suddenly you are upon something exquisite and wonderful, these moments are hypnotic when they arrive.  Christian Curnyn conducting the ENO orchestra brought a subtle subdued tone from the pit, saving their own fury for the final act, Curnyn is a huge advocate of Charpentier’s music and you could feel his vibrant joy. As for the chorus, they were the best I’ve seen them, I could gush about how good they were, a highlight of the evening.

This might not be perfect, but it was superb and more than good enough to forgive the odd flaw; Miss Havershams writhing dusty imps and the endless gratuitous daddy-action played out on stage. When Medaes scorn and rage is finally unleashed Connolly becomes the centre of furious attention, her final horrifying condemnation as she rises into the night is an astonishing piece of visual theatre, backed up by the power of a tremendous voice used at full capacity, and a packed theatre holding its breath; it was stunning.

Highly Recommended: McVicars’ vision of Medea is victorious.

ENO

London Coliseum

Tickets from £18

Performances on 15,20,22,28 Feb & 6,8,12,14 & 15 of March

For more info or to book tickets see the ENO website here:

 

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