Philip Edwards, Author at North West End UK

Betty Legs Diamond Show – Stockport Plaza

2May

By Philip EdwardsNo Comments

North West

Betty Legs Diamond Show – Stockport Plaza

Tonight was a night at the theatre for enjoyment, not to write reviews, yet here I am clacking the keyboard at 11am!!!! Fact is, I want to share news about the confection of a show I have just seen at the always lovely Plaza Theatre, Stockport. Drag is being, pardon the pun, dragged through the hedge backwards by right wing politicians who find it, well, subversive I guess, but as has always been the case, subversion can be a power for good. That is exactly the case with The Betty Legs Diamond show, currently touring. Betty was the legendary host of Funny Girls club in Blackpool and, cutting a long story short, she/he/they are now taking the show on the road. With a talented cast of six dancers Ms Diamond has filled the stage with movement and comedy that remind us that the...

Steel Magnolias – The Lowry

There has been a theory knocking about that there are no great parts for older female actors being written. Well, that’s not quite true is it. Because, even if “Steel Magnolias” was written in the 1980’s the story is timeless and each of the six characters offer are, in their own way great, from Annelle with her mysterious past to Ouiser Boudreaux who is larger than life and an open book. Author Robert Harling based each of the six characters on people he grew up with. It must have been like growing up on the set of “The Golden Girls” with all the zinging one liners and “girl talk” he has recalled. Set in the hair salon owned by Truvey Jones, at the heart of the story are Shelby and her mother M’Lynn what happens to them during the two years of the story and the friendship of the other ...

Naked Hope – Seabright Productions

These days, much is said about people being able to choose pronouns which apply to them. Quentin Crisp is one of the people who might debate his chosen pronoun, yet I get the feeling he would have poo pooed the whole idea. “Be who you are whenever you want” I think I can hear him say in that nasal drawl which was one of his trademarks. That nasal drawl was an attribute Mark Farrelly used sparingly In the first part of the play, but used to great effect in the second part. However, I’m ahead of myself. When we first meet Farrellys’ Quentin recounting his early life, I was distracted by the Phyllis Pearce wig and the dead centre of the forehead microphone. Fortunately, the actor drew me back very quickly with many of Quentin Crisp’s standard phrases “I’m not just a homosexual, bu...