#3: go to the theatre together

Straight off the bat, I’m not theatrophobic: I’m always glad of a sit-down. But I’ve created a rod for my own back by opening with a phobia in the last two entries, so here we find ourselves.

This may seem like an odd addition to the bucket list given how utterly simple it is but in all our sixteen years together, Paul and I have never been to the theatre together. We’ve seen plenty of comedians and the like, but never an actual play. Every play we have seen we have done so apart from each other – Les Misérables being my personal favourite and Blood Brothers his. Mind you, I saw Les Misérables a couple of years before Paul and I got together, when an ex bought me tickets so we would have an excuse to visit London together for a passion-fuelled romp (away from his boyfriend, gasp) (and mine too, double gasp). Listen, I was young, I didn’t have the moral compass I do now. Also, the word romp needs to make a resurgence. I know it was the mainstay of tabloid shitrags like the News of the World who would always describe some philandering Member of Parliament as having a drug-fuelled romp, but I feel like we could reclaim it.

There’s a few performances that we have seen over the years which I suppose count as a theatrical show, but you wouldn’t necessarily see them reviewed in The Guardian or discussed over haughty laughter and canapés around a dinner table. For example, we once watched a tribute act to Sticky Vicky. For those that aren’t quite up to date in the world of vaginal magic – and honestly, those that don’t keep up deserve a clit ‘round the ear – Sticky Vicky was a performer whose main schtick was pulling all sorts of exciting objects out of her squishy-mitten. She wasn’t messing about either, and understandably so: I don’t think the crowds would have gasped in awe had she plopped out one of those mini-rolls of Love Hearts you get in a Swizzels Matlow tub, after all. No, she made razorblades and sausages (presumably pre-cooked, you wouldn’t want them spitting) and handkerchiefs tumble out and, my personal favourite, a lit lightbulb. It was like a trip to B&Q, only more Bewitchment & Quim rather than Block & Quayle.

Doing a quick bit of research on Sticky Vicky led me down an unexpected rabbit-hole (don’t worry, she’ll pull me out after the handkerchiefs) of trademark law. Turns out that another Spanish lady with a commodious vagina tried to register ‘Sticky Vicky’ as her own trademark, leading to a legal battle between the two. Happily, the Spanish authorities decided that Vicky was the Numero Uno Mago Vaginal (that was a disappointing google translate, I was hoping for a pun), decided the imposter was acting in bad faith, and awarded the trademark to the original Sticky Vicky. Quite right too. I mention this because I spent three years of my life working in trademark law and the most exciting case I had to try and defend involved the curvature of a single letter ‘S’ on a label. Had I been arguing the toss about who was the first to pull a toaster-oven out of her foof, I’d perhaps have been more engaged.

Back to the present. A few months ago Paul had succumbed to some facebook advertising (as he is prone to do – not a week goes by without the postman tickling our letterbox with some tat from Temu) and bought us tickets to see Stranger Sings, the musical based on the 1995 episode of Panorama where Princess Diana fluttered her eyelashes at Martin Bashir. Of course not – can you imagine – it’s based on seasons one and two of Stranger Things. He then promptly forgot about them until his phone popped up with a reminder the morning of the showing and, in the absence of having anything else to do in the evening other than talk to each other, off we went.

In another first for us, Stranger Sings was being held at The Sage in Gateshead, just over the river from where we used to live. We’d never been, despite being so close, although I did once hide a treasure hunt clue in there. They’ve recently renamed The Sage as The Glasshouse International Centre for Music but I’ll be in my cold, cold grave before I give in to typing all those extra letters out again. If you’ve ever travelled into Newcastle by train you’ll have seen it from the window as you pass over the Tyne: it’s the building that looks like a giant woodlouse sat by the river. Others call it an armadillo, some say it looks like a spent condom. Speaking of those, if you were to look out of the other side of the train you’d have seen Newcastle’s biggest cruising/dogging ground, fact fans. On either side of the bridge, culture was being spread amongst the locals. They’ve since built a police station nearby which has put off all but the most determined rawdoggers, but if you look carefully as you trundle over the bridge you’ll more than likely still spot moonlight bouncing off the cheeks of a pale arse.

As mentioned at the opener, this entry there isn’t really a phobia or fear involved, but then this blog isn’t meant to be about conquering fears so much as it is an excuse for me to barrel out 2,000 words doing something I’ve been putting off before I’m forty. That said, there are a couple of associated low-level anxieties I can mention, including one which I unexpectedly share with my husband. The first is seating: years of my width challenging my height for supremacy has left me slightly fitful at the thought of squeezing into theatre and cinema seats. This is compounded by many evenings spent at the Tyne Theatre, where you’re packed so closely together you’ve got to lift your neighbour’s tit out of your bag of Revels if you need to get up. And getting up – that’s another! I have a seriously strong bladder: I treat the need to micturate more as an early warning alarm rather than an urgent get-to-the-netty call that others (namely, Paul) seem to suffer with. If I need a wee, I’ve got an hour or so before things become critical. That ability seems to disappear the moment I’m sat anywhere I can’t easily get up though and I end up paining myself for the first act because I don’t want to have to brush my arse across the faces of the other people in our row as I lumber clumsily to the toilet.

The other anxiety is perhaps even more ridiculous, though. I’m always worried that I’m going to catch the eye of the folks on stage and, should I not be smiling appreciatively or laughing gaily, they’ll take that as negative feedback on their performance. I know I’m exactly the type who, if the roles were reversed, would take that to heart – over 7,500 5* reviews on Amazon at the moment and it’s the 17 1* reviews that I remember – and so I try very hard to counter it. I’m aware of how Main Character Behaviour that is, but Paul has the exact same fear, and so you’ll find us both giving big smiles and hearty laughs throughout just in case. It’s perhaps only proper that we haven’t been to more plays, actually: I can’t imagine an actor giving his most emotional soliloquy in an Angels of America performance would welcome the sight of two bald heads reflecting the stage lights back at him, cheerfully giving two thumbs up as though we’re Guy Fieri reviewing a truck-stop breakfast.

In words that I am absolutely going to get etched on my gravestone, I needn’t have worried: we had plenty of space as no-one sat beside us (literally the only empty seats in the house, which we’ll try not to take personally) and the show itself was absolutely superb: laugh out loud funny and full of incredible songs. All of the cast were fantastic but a special mention has to go out to the actress portraying a manic Winona Ryder, who has easily the best song of the show – plus her dual role as Will’s puppeteer. As you would expect, we both agreed that the lad playing Hopper was a delight, can’t think why. Although a slight disappointment they didn’t go with season three Hopper as a look: that podgy belly and the big moustache is a treat for tired eyes. I’m currently cultivating a moustache for Movember and would have loved some solidarity shown, because mine just makes me look like a flasher.  Although let the record show: I don’t think Hopper is the best looking bloke in Stranger Things: that accolade goes to Billy (sob) and as a back-up, Bob (sob). Oh, and Benny (sob-sob-sob). Tell me I’m wrong.

In Memoriam

We had plenty of time to discuss the performance as we waited to leave the car-park. In their infinite wisdom, the owners of The Sage have elected to have only two pay-points for the entire car-park, meaning we joined a queue of about 100 people waiting to pay for their parking and leave. This wouldn’t be such an issue if the great British public didn’t crumble into utter idiocy under the pressure of inserting a ticket into a machine and following it up with payment. It mystifies me how so many people can be presented with this fairly innocuous two-step procedure and suddenly act as though they’re on the Intelligence round of the Krypton Factor, battling to build a tessellating pattern of flags whilst Sandra, (a Civil Servant from East Norwich), Mike (a Civil Servant from Norwich) and Kevin (a Retired Civil Servant from West Norwich) beat them into fourth place. After ten minutes of watching everything from the ticket being pushed into the note-acceptor, a handful of coins being spilled on the floor and then someone trying to pay using their contactless Clubcard on their phone, I went to ‘warm up the car’. I didn’t need to turn the heating on: my simmering rage at people’s stupidity did the trick nicely.

We then had to wait another thirty minutes whilst the car-park emptied out, with my earlier decision to park right at the back to avoid getting my car dinged biting me sorely on the arse as we stayed right at the end of the jam. The British are known for polite queueing but there must have been something in the white wine spritzers because good lord were people itching to get away. This meant that rather than politely zippering the queues – you let one person out ahead, and then go yourself – it went full every man for himself. It was like Mad Max but with an embarrassment of Honda Jazzes and barley travel sweets. I’ve decided that embarrassment is the collective noun for a plethora of Honda Jazzes by the way, in much the same way as a ‘’limousine of slappers’ works. At one point I allowed someone to go in front of me and was met with theatrical hand gestures from the old biddy behind me, as though she was furiously conducting an orchestra from the comfort of her built-up seat cushion. Naturally, I allowed another two cars to slip in front as I took stock of her gesticulations. I do hope she passed in the night.

We’ve since learned that you can avoid all of the above drama by taking the Metro to Gateshead for free if you have tickets for The Sage, although you will have to time it carefully to make sure you catch the one train a week that actually runs. We know for next time, and there will be a next time, as we are going to see Home Alone performed with a live orchestra in December. Can’t wait.

Once we arrived home and gave the dog his double cheeseburger by way of apology for having the temerity to leave him alone for a couple of hours, we agreed (Paul and I, the dog didn’t care) that it had been a great night, parking ire aside. It seemed like such an obvious thing for a couple to have done – to go to the theatre together – but somehow it had never come up. Now we get to tick that off and whilst I can’t see us becoming serious theatre-goers (Paul doesn’t have the facial profile for a beret), at least we had a bit of culture for just one night. Plus, I ticked another thing off my bucket list, and that’s always a win.

Oh! £18.80 for two pints of Madri and two cartons of water can fuck right off, though.

List progress: 3/39

5 November 2023