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‘Stay Beautiful’ Bowie Specials support trans project

Due to popular demand, Stay Beautiful, the glam-punk-alternative club, will be now holding two David Bowie Specials in support of the Clare Project, the local trans support group.

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The parties will take place at Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar in Middle Street, Brighton on Saturday, February 6 (sold out) and Saturday, February 13 from 11pm.

The club, which usually takes place every first Saturday of the month and prides itself on attracting a crowd of ‘extravagantly-clad party monsters’, has pledged a minimum of 20% of the door money to the Clare Project and there’ll be collections on the night, allowing you plenty of chance to show your support. In addition, Sticky Mike’s have waived its normal hire fee and will be donating that to the charity.

DJ Simon Price, who’ll be spinning glam-punk-alternative anthems alongside Bowie, Bowie and more Bowie, says: “We always have a Stay Beautiful Bowie Special, once a year, and it’s usually a popular night, but the interest this year has been phenomenal (for obvious reasons) so we decided we’d like to donate some of the proceeds to a suitable local cause, as well as encouraging our audience to dip into their own pockets.”


Event: Stay Beautiful Bowie Specials in support of the Clare Project.

When: Saturday, February 6 (sold out) and Saturday, February 13 from 11pm.

Where: Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar, 9-12 Middle St, Brighton, BN1 1AL.

Entry: Tickets £5.50 in advance from We Got Tickets.

For more information about the Clare Project, click here:

For more information about Stay Beautiful, click here:

Brighton Council Leader sounds warning about future service delivery

“Cuts are putting people in need of care at risk. The Government needs to act”, says Cllr Warren Morgan, Leader of Brighton & Hove City Council.

Cllr Warren Morgan
Cllr Warren Morgan, Leader of Brighton & Hove City Council

It is wrong for politicians to be alarmist, to cause concern in order to score political points. It’s referred to as “shroud-waving”. I’ve criticised others for doing so, and I’ve thought long and hard about publishing this post. I do so not to win votes or do down the other side, but out of genuine fear both for the people who need social care and those charged with providing it.

I posted recently about the competing campaigns against various cuts we are being forced to make to services because of the reduction and eventual removal of the Government’s Revenue Support Grant which until now has provided around a third of our funding. As that funding reduces and ultimately disappears, the cost of providing social care services is rising rapidly.

Those cost increases are down to a huge range of factors. An ageing population, increasing poverty, welfare reform, growing pressures on the NHS, growing numbers of children being identified as a risk, and more. It is right that care workers are paid the Living Wage, but the requirement on providers to pay it brings a cost.

In around four years, without a combination of additional resources and new ways of working, the costs of social care will consume the entire council budget, save for some basic environmental services like refuse collection. In the coming year almost £20 million of risk has been identified across our social care services in Brighton and Hove.

High profile failures like Victoria Climbie, Baby P or Rotherham cannot be allowed to happen again if we can possibly prevent it.

Whether it is services for frail older people, vulnerable adults with learning disabilities, or children at risk of abuse, it is your local council that is responsible for looking after them. If those council care services fail, it is the service directors who are held legally responsible. Councillors are legally and morally responsible as corporate parents for children in care.

Without a proper funding regime involving the collaboration of all agencies, any further cuts to social care budgets by the Government could, in the near future, lead to formal notification by those directors that they cannot guarantee a safe level of care.

The 2% council tax increase, ring-fenced for social care, will bring in an extra £2.2 million each year. It sounds a lot but it isn’t sufficient to meet the increased costs and demand.

Urgent action on the part of Government is needed, before people are put at risk.

Cllr Warren Morgan is the Labour Leader of Brighton and Hove City Council and this piece appears on his personal blog.

To view the blog, click here:

The campest workshop in town!

For followers of camp and comedy there promises to be one of the campest workshops in Eastbourne for some time for older gay people.

Larry Grayson
Larry Grayson

Locals will be given a chance to do their best Larry Grayson impersonation, when a London Theatre Producer will launch his new script on Eastbourne Rainbow, the Eastbourne group for older gay people.

The project to engage older gay people in theatre, has been launched by the Royal Hippodrome Theatre (RHT) working with Cutting the Strings Theatre Company.

The Workshop will take place on Wednesday February 24 at 2pm at the Venton Centre on Junction Road in Eastbourne and will involve group members playing out the role of comedian  and Generation Game host, Larry Grayson.

Members will be using the newly written script from the play Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry which will be playing at the RHT during Easter week.

Darren Weir
Darren Weir

Darren Weir, Community Engagement Director of the RHT, says: “We are working with Age Concern and the Rainbow group to devise new ways to help older people keep active and creative.  Supported by the Arts Council the project will use the group to help shape and develop the new script for the show, which looks at the last performance by Larry at the Royal Variety show in 1994.”


Event: Workshop: Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry

Where: Venton Centre, Junction Road, Eastbourne, BN21 3QY

When: Wednesday, February 24

Time: 2pm

WEB.600.2The show Three Days and Three Minutes with Larry will play at RHT on March 24-26 at 7.30 pm with a Saturday Matinee at 3 pm.

For tickets telephone: 01323 80 20 20

Interview: Tom Stuart – ‘I Am Not Myself These Days’

I am not myself these days, Tom Stuart’s stage adaptation of the 2006 New York Times best-seller of the same name, was a big hit at the 2015 Edinburgh Fringe.

I am not myself these days

Josh Kilmer-Purcell’s original memoir is the true story of the author’s touching but increasingly desperate relationship with Jack, a high-class rent boy addicted to crack.  It’s largely told through the eyes of Josh’s alcoholic alter ego, the hilariously outrageous but increasingly fragile Aqua, a well-known New York drag queen.

Stuart’s show has been described as breathtakingly physical, heart-breaking and profoundly moving, but the play, like the book, is also very funny.

As part of a national tour, it’s now coming to Brighton Dome Studio on February 13, so GScene met up with Tom to talk about the joys and challenges of bringing this deeply moving, funny and sometimes brutal work to the stage.

You’re currently in rehearsal. How’s it been, coming back to the play after a six month break? “It’s beautiful to revisit it. I’ve really genuinely missed playing Aqua. It’s extraordinary to be back inside her skin again. It’s like wearing a layer of armour when I’m playing her. She makes me stand taller and a bit braver.”

The show was very well received at Edinburgh.  Are you doing any rewriting or fine tuning now that you’ve had some time to stand back and reflect? “I’ve done a bit of trimming and refocusing. Playing Aqua so many times in such an intense period at Edinburgh gave me a real feel for what works and what doesn’t.  What’s also lovely about coming back to the role after a big break, it’s that it’s become more layered in the performance. I think the performance has more depth because time has passed and the role has sunk into me in a different way.”

One of the wonderful things about the book is the distinctive character and voice of Josh as himself and as Aqua. It’s so well written, honest and funny.“The reason why I was attracted to the book immediately was that there is something very clean and direct about Josh’s writing voice that speaks very clearly to the reader. There’s something very immediate about it – a visceral honesty that I knew would work well on a stage.  Setting the book as a play allows me, the actor, to talk directly to the audience.”

The book is quite long – was it a challenge to make it manageable for a one man performance? “In my play I tried to get to the core of the book without losing any of its colours and depths and layers. You do have to be careful what you take out or you lose how multi-faceted the characters are, and how complex the situation is, and how funny it is, and how sad it is – you want as much as possible to translate that into the play.”

So how did you hear about the story, and what made you want to adapt it? “My friend Kathy gave the book to me because she thought I’d just enjoy it as a read, not knowing that she would spark off this amazing five-year journey. I was going through a break up at the time and though my circumstances where completely different, I felt a real affinity with the characters.  Josh’s writing made me feel really understood, though his circumstances in the story were very extreme.  But I thought the story could connect with anyone.”

And bringing it to the stage was a way of doing that? “Yes”.

Did you have much experience of drag culture before writing the play? “This has been a massive series of firsts for me. I’d never written anything, I’d never performed a one man show, and I’d never worn high heels. I’d never had to wear so much make-up, or lip sync. But I’ve always admired drag queens and culture, and been fascinated by it. Part of the real joy in researching was going to these incredible bars, enjoying different types of drag and getting a deeper sense of queer theatre.”

In the book Josh talks about the intensity of the ritual of transforming into Aqua, and also about the agonising pain he endures every time he dons the corset and high heels. Is this something you can relate to having created the stage role? “Even now as we speak my feet are absolutely throbbing.  Playing Aqua is a real undertaking. It takes me two hours to put the make up on. Thankfully I wear a stage version of a corset so it’s actually a lot more comfortable than Aqua’s. And having to have my body waxed – I don’t know how people can keep doing that and maintain that level of upkeep.  Having the hairs pulled out of your legs is really painful and on some level it’s the strangest thing to do.”

“But for Aqua, her transformation is about putting on her armour, and I do get a sense of that in the role. I do feel very powerful in the heels and the costume. But what’s also fantastic is that I slowly get to strip back the armour and the character becomes more and more vulnerable. It’s beautiful in the book where Aqua talks about Josh gradually seeping through the mask, and it’s a fascinating thing to be able to interpret that when performing.”

What would you like audiences to take away with them from the play? “Well, I want people to have a really good time. It’s a powerful and emotional story but it’s also extremely funny. But I think whatever your background you’ll find something in Josh’s plight, because he’s experiencing deeply human problems, and if you peel away all the crazy circumstance they’re the same problems as we all go through.  If there was an intent behind me doing the play, it’s that there’s more that connects us than divides us. The bare bones of the story are incredibly human. We all love, and lose love, and struggle with our sense of self so it’s a deeply human struggle. Pain is pain and love is love, loss is loss, no matter what age, background, gender you are – any of those things. We’re all just human beings underneath it all.”

I am not myself these days plays at the Brighton Dome Studio on Saturday, February 13, 2016

To book tickets online, click here:

REVIEW: Alice in Pantoland: Alice, Alice who the fuck is Alice?

After the untimely death of Brian Ralfe last year, Lee Tracey and the cast of Alice in Pantoland return to the Studio Theatre at the Dome to continue the tradition of outrageous adult entertainment championed by Brian since 2002.

Alice in Pantoland

Written by Lee Tracey and David Rumelle, Alice in Pantoland is a chaotic romp by Alice through a variety of the best loved traditional pantos including Jack and the Beanstalk, Dick Wittington, Cinderella and Peter Pan, and provides each performer with a moment to shine.

Lee Tracey is the focus of the show, playing both Sarah the Cook and the Ugly Sister ‘Hernia’. Lee was one of London’s most successful stand up comics in the 70s, 80s and 90s and gives an old school performance full of outrageous and most of the time offensive expletives that some will love, while some might feel uncomfortable with. The audience on the night I went were mainly straight women, all benefitting from a few drinks, and they clearly loved the patter.

Cabaret performer Topsie Redfern almost steals the show playing three parts in all; Alice, the Fairy Godmother and The Ugly Sister ‘Verruca’. Topsie has a fantastic voice and his characterisations of all three is spot on as is his vocal performance. A live wire performer who would really benefit from having more numbers to sing.

David Raven graced the stage as Idle Jack in the first half and an old pussy in the second. The audience loved his old pussy number which was one of the highlights of the evening.

Lascal Wood as Devil plays the baddie, but I found it hard to hiss or boo him as he was so lovely. A former X Factor finalist and star of the West End Show Thriller the Musical, where he played Michael Jackson, Lascal has a beautiful voice especially in the high register and is a sharp mover. It would be great to see him given more freedom to do both as we were only treated to a few snatches of his dancing ability during the evening. Lascal is a very accomplished performer.

Russell Keith strikes a confident and endearing Prince Charming. Another great vocalist and a natural charmer. He lights up the stage each time he appears and the audience really warm to him.

Jack Seager plays Tinkerballs and The White Rabbit. A great singer and mover, but sadly some of his patter was lost on a noisy audience who at times made more noise than the performers on the stage.

Scott Virgo is a stalwart of these adult pantos and played a strutting dandy Dick and after all as he reminded us “we all need a bit of dick sometimes”. Moving quickly on…….

Jason Prince revelled in the role of the camp, gushing Will Scarlet as only Jason can with his gin and tonic voice, turning suitably nasty and evil for his later appearance as Captain Hook.

Finally, Pooh La May aka Collin Day played The Empress of China for sympathy spending most of the evening begging to be given the opportunity to sing. When the moment arrived he did not disappoint.

If you are an adult panto virgin don’t go along expecting spectacular sets and production values. It is not that kind of show. The set is bare most of the time and the production stands or falls on the quality of the performances. This years production was packed with fantastic singers and I personally would have loved to have heard much more singing from them all.

Finally hats off to Jamie Lees the musical director who works with backing tracks and plays live from his keyboard producing a colourful and effective musical accompaniment to the show.

Alice in Pantoland runs till February 7.

Brighton Emporium Theatre supports newcomers

Emporium Theatre in London Road, Brighton, will be supporting three recipients of The Pebble Trust Awards at this year’s Brighton Fringe, which will run from May 6-June 5.

Emporium

The productions Did I Choose These Shoes? by Ella Gajic, Abelia Saxophone Quartet and Josh Glavin: Growing Pains will all run at various dates to be confirmed in May.

The Pebble Trust is a Brighton and Hove charity established to provide support to local people and causes.

Louise Arnell, trustee at The Pebble Trust, said: “We are absolutely delighted that the award-winning Emporium Theatre will play host to all three events this May. Like The Pebble Trust, the team at Emporium Theatre is committed to supporting young artists at the beginning of their careers. Josh, Hannah and Ella will benefit hugely, not only from the theatre’s wonderful facilities, but also from the encouragement and advice they will receive from the Emporium team as they prepare their events.”

“We are very excited to be able to offer full venue support and guidance about putting on a show at the Fringe from day one throughout the whole process, which can often seem quite daunting,” comments Emporium director James Weisz. “Emporium Theatre was voted Best Venue at last year’s Brighton Festival so we have plenty of experience.”

For more information on the projects and the venue, click here: 

New advocacy service for trans communities

MindOut, the LGBT mental health project and Healthwatch Brighton and Hove are to jointly set up the city’s first Trans Advocacy Service.

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Jointly funded by Brighton & Hove Clinical Commissioning Group and Brighton and Hove City Council, the service will provide person-centred advocacy support for the Trans communities in Brighton and Hove.

The Advocacy Service will offer advice, information, representation and case work support on all issues related to Trans care pathways, including services and treatment at the Gender Identity Clinic and:

♦  Primary and secondary health care

♦  Social Care

♦  Legal issues

♦  Family and relationships

♦  Employment

♦  Housing

♦  Hate crime, harassment and bullying

♦  Diagnosis

♦ Treatment options, referral systems and waiting times as well as health issues not related to the trans care pathway

All MindOut services are free, independent, impartial and confidential.

Research into the mental health needs of Trans people shows that 84% of respondents experienced suicidal distress, dropping to 3% post transition demonstrating a clear indication of the life-saving potential of prompt and timely support.

Helen Jones
Helen Jones

Helen Jones, Director of MindOut said: ”We are so pleased to be able to provide much-needed, dedicated support for Trans communities. We look forward to working closely with local Trans groups and organisations to meet growing needs.”

Nicky Cambridge, Chief Executive of Healthwatch Brighton and Hove, added: “Healthwatch is delighted to be part of this project. We will ensure that the issues being raised by Trans people accessing services are raised at local and national levels so that systems improve and change permanently. We will do this with the community who have faced institutional prejudice and discrimination for far too long.”

Dr Sam Hall
Dr Sam Hall

Dr Sam Hall, Chair of Clare Project and Trans Alliance representative, said: “This is a fantastic example of how the Trans Needs Assessment can be used as a springboard to achieve equality of access to services for Brighton & Hove’s trans residents and service users. We look forward to working with MindOut to ensure that the best possible use is made of this new service.”

For more information about MindOut, click here:

BLAGSS to play football friendly against Sussex County FA XI

February is Football.v.Homophobia (FvH) month.

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FvH is an international initiative opposing homophobia in football at all levels – from grassroots to professional clubs.

To demonstrate the Sussex County FA’s support for the campaign, an exhibition match will take place on Monday February 1, 2016 between a Sussex County FA XI and the football team from Brighton Lesbian and Gay Sports Society (BLAGSS).

FvH is a campaign uniting fans, players, communities, grassroots teams, professional clubs and the football authorities in opposing homophobia and prejudice against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in football.

Sussex County FA actively promote Football for Everyone and encourage the involvement of the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) communities in Sussex football.

This encouragement has led to BLAGSS affiliating as a football club with the Sussex County FA, enabling them to participate in affiliated football within in the county.

This friendly match will celebrate their affiliation as well as promote the values of the Football.v.Homophobia campaign which has been backed by the County FA since its inception in 2010.

Members of the general public are invited to attend the match and show their support for the campaign, entry is free of charge, and refreshments will be available to purchase.


Event: Sussex County FA XI vs. Brighton Lesbian and Gay Sports Society (BLAGSS)

Where: Sussex County FA HQ, Culver Road, Lancing, West Sussex, BN15 9AX

When: Monday, February 1

Time: 8pm

Entry: Free

For more information, click here:

 

New online GP Guide for supporting trans patients

Local NHS Brighton and Hove Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) launches the country’s first online guide for supporting trans patients in GP surgeries.

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The guide’s publication follows a recent Parliamentary inquiry into Transgender Equality in the UK, which published a report earlier this month claiming that:

♦     Trans people encounter significant problems in using general NHS services due to the attitude of some clinicians and other staff when providing care for trans patients

♦     This is attributable to lack of knowledge and understanding

♦    and GPs in particular too often lack an understanding of trans identities, the diagnosis of gender dysphoria, referral pathways into Gender Identity Services, and their own role in prescribing hormone treatment.

The CCG’s guide has been developed with input from local transgender people in Brighton and Hove and aims to help GPs and other clinical staff in General Practice support patients accessing NHS Specialist Gender Identity Services.

According to estimates, at least 2,760 trans people live in the city, with many more coming to the city to study and work.

Last year, Brighton & Hove City Council published the results of the city’s first ever Trans Needs Assessment.

The report revealed that:

♦  Just 1 in 5 trans people in the city said they were in good health (compared with four out of five in the wider population).

♦ Four in five had also experienced depression and one in three had self-harmed in the last five years.

♦ The assessment also identified that improvements could be made to trans people’s experience of health services, including local GP and specialist services, and that long waiting times for gender identity services had a detrimental impact on the lives of those affected.

The Needs Assessment recommended the development of good quality information for clinicians on support for trans people accessing healthcare in the city.

The experience of approaching a GP for advice and support can be daunting for many transgender people.

Local trans patient, Michael, explains: “When I first went to my GP’s surgery to seek support around my trans identity a number of years ago I was incredibly nervous. The locum GP I saw was, though well-meaning, not very well-informed. I remember him asking me if I liked cars and football – an entirely surreal line of questioning, unrelated to helping me access the support I needed. I left with an informal diagnosis of ‘metrosexual’ gender identity and (more helpfully) a forward referral which I’d had to instruct him in writing.

“Since then, I’ve been really pleased to see how much work has been done on a local and national level to improve services for trans people, and am proud to have played my small part in some of that work. I’m lucky to have a much more understanding and knowledgeable GP now than I did then,  but am so pleased to see this guide being released as it will help all GPs across the city to offer a competent, supportive service to the trans community.

“So often we can find ourselves passed from pillar to post, having to educate those responsible for our care; I hope that this guide can help to relieve that burden – promoting a better standard of understanding, a better standard of communication and a better standard of care for everyone.”

Dr Katie Stead
Dr Katie Stead

Dr Katie Stead, Clinical Lead for Primary Care and Public Health at the CCG and a member of Brighton and Hove’s Trans Needs Assessment Steering Group, said: “This new guide is important because although there are many good examples of excellent primary care for our trans population, there is also a lack of education and information for GPs available both nationally and locally. We hope it goes some way in plugging this gap locally and will give GPs the confidence to work with trans patients to provide great care.”

NHS Brighton and Hove CCG has compiled a five-point checklist called 5 things you need to know when you speak to your GP, that addresses some of the concerns and scenarios trans patients may encounter when they visit their GP, drawing on the experiences of local trans patients.

To read the five point checklist, click here:

To read NHS Brighton and Hove CCG’s Trans Guidance Guide for GPs, click here: 

To read the Transgender Equality in the UK was published by the Government Equalities Office in January 2016, click here:

 

Portsmouth University marks LGBT History Month

University of Portsmouth celebrates LGBT History Month in February with a film festival and a free public lecture.

Dr Dominic Janes
Dr Dominic Janes

On Wednesday, February 3, Dr Dominic Janes, Reader in Cultural History and Visual Studies at Birkbeck, University of London will deliver a lecture.

In Visions of Queer Martyrdom: sexual and spiritual lives before lesbian and gay liberation, Dr Janes will argue that religion and homosexuality are not as antagonistic as they might appear.

The academic will demonstrate that Catholic forms of Christianity played a key role in the evolution of the culture and visual expression of homosexuality and same-sex desire in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Touching on everything from the ‘queer families’ of Victorian monasteries to the work of writers and artists such as Oscar Wilde and Derek Jarman, the lecture promises to illustrate both the limitations and ongoing significance of Christianity as an inspiration for expressions of homoerotic desire.

Dr Janes’ free public lecture will take place at the Portland Building, University of Portsmouth, Portland St, Portsmouth PO1 3AH on Wednesday, February 3, from 6pm to 7pm.

To book a free place, click here:

Meanwhile, on Thursday, February 4, the Pride LGBT Film Festival gets under way with a screening of The Imitation Game, starring Benedict Cumberbatch as pioneering computer scientist and code-breaker Alan Turing, who was chemically castrated after being charged with gross indecency.

On Thursday, February 11, The Portsmouth Film Society season, supported by the University’s LGBT Staff Forum [LINK], continues with 52 Tuesdays. Shot in real-time every Tuesday over a year, the award-winning Australian film charts the evolving relationship between a girl and her mother, who is transitioning to become a man.

On Thursday, February 18, is A Girl At My Door, about a Korean police academy graduate who is transferred to a small village due to ‘misconduct’.

The season concludes on Wednesday, February 24 with the premiere of Departure, a French-British co-production about a teenage boy wrestling with his sexuality while on a family holiday in the south of France.

All screenings will take place in Portland Building, University of Portsmouth, Portland St, Portsmouth PO1 3AH at 7pm.

For tickets and more information about the film festival, click here:

 

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