Masterchef Australia. I may have mentioned this one before. This is addictive and warm-hearted television. The saviour of reality television. Leaves the British version dead in the water. Catch it on UK Watch - a great advert for council house tele. There is a certain sort of programme I am never enthusiastic about watching but which captivates when it is on. This exemplifies the category. It is on as I type. One can smell the bread they are baking.
Next up is one of the heroes of English rugby. Phil 'Raging Bull' Vickery manages to be expert and unassuming in his role as colour commentator for ITV in its RWC coverage. During Wales' heroic but somehow predictable defeat to South Africa Vickery was unstinting in his praise of the Welsh. Above all else he did it with a sincerity the English can struggle to attain. Matt Dawson might take note.
Saw this in London last week with Mum (her present from
Players for directing
Little Women). This is not as good as the wild publicity suggests - it's better. Sentimental, yes. A little predictable, perhaps. But by a mile the best puppet show since
Thunderbirds. Please see
War Horse. Do not wait for the Spielberg film (
The Overgraduate eschews the wrteched prevalence of the term 'movie') which will at best be different and, more probably, a travesty. It will dismiss any doubts you may have about the relevance of theatre. It does things which no other medium can handle. Standing ovation from the matinee audience - no mean feat given your average age in a matinee crowd. I felt positively juvenile.
That London. Home of the world's most honourable university. Our own city state and whether the rest of us like it or not, Britain's greatest hope of economic revival. I can even detect a vibrant dillapidated charm in the underground - a system which throbs with purpose if not with beauty. I also love having an Oyster card.
That London. Home of the world's most honourable university. Our own city state and whether the rest of us like it or not, Britain's greatest hope of economic revival. I can even detect a vibrant dillapidated charm in the underground - a system which throbs with purpose if not with beauty. I also love having an Oyster card.
Dear And beloved over graduate,
ReplyDeleteIt is with a sorrow in my heart I read this post!
I have to beg to differ with a learned man who has spent his entire dynamic working life helping poor souls like me. The economic revival will NOT come from those greedy overpaid incompetent pricks in London. Quite why someone hasn't spotted the emperors clothes yet I have no idea!
The sad factor that if we get tough we wil lose these "holy people"
They got us in this shit so get rid and give some cheaper less wasteful rick a go, can't be any worse!
My down to earth hard working factory employees oblivious to these arseholes don't deserve another disaster to the tiny pension funds they have managed to accumulate (if any), shame on you London, I was once a part of the"professional "elite"" and am now verging on the ashamed.
Get down and get your hands dirty England if you want us to rise again.
Hear endeth the lesson!
JB
Ps streets looks more like the "honourable sir dig by" each time I look at his photo.
Pps Manu looks more English each day and even Shontayne is sounding Anglo Saxon!
ReplyDeleteI stand corrected. Well, almost. I'm with you all the way old man on the incompetent and the overpaid. Shun the lot of them. On this one I agree with Saint Vince of Twickenham, though not with his vacuous plans to deal with it. Business needs a moral rearmament, not a political one. In my perfect world good old UK plc takes the world lead on this. As with John Lennon, you may say I'm a dreamer!
ReplyDeleteYou're right about Lord Jones and Gary Street - has anyone ever seen them in the same room? We should be told.