Party winner announced

Yes, just the one entry to our competition in which we are giving away tickets to the West End Whingers party. And he has won all six tickets because (a) it made us laugh uproariously (albeit through slightly gritted teeth) and (b) his was the only entry. Strange. Perhaps the Internet has been down or something. Anyway, here is the winning entry:

Why I deserve to attend the West End Whingers party

Hello, I’m Graham. I always post under the name ‘Graham’ because I’m working towards being universally recognised by one name only, like Cher, Madonna and Biggins.

I know you requested an essay, but if I spent time writing one I’d never get any rummy played. So the main points of my submission to be allowed into your gathering are:

• I am passionate about the theatre and go about three times a week. I know you don’t ‘do’ television and only occasionally wind up the wireless, but tonight I will be missing the first episode of the new series of Desperate Housewives in order to see National Treasure Anita Dobson in Hello Dolly. That’s how zealous I am
• I like red wine
• I like red wine in a ‘jus’ around breast of pheasant (I’m assuming there will be some)
• Like you, my idea of ‘proper’ theatre is watching a Dame (or Penelope Keith) enclosed in a proscenium arch
• If I come to your party and don’t like it then I shall leave at half time
• If I come to your party and enjoy myself then I may still leave at half time as an example of humorous post-modern expressionism
• Whenever I suggest theatre to friends I say something is on ‘at the…at the moment…’
• I’m going to the Jerry Herman concert in May purely to see Angela Lansbury and I hope she doesn’t cancel like she did with the Steven Sondheim tribute a few years ago that I’d booked purely to see her and then she didn’t show just because she was having a new hip fitted not that I’m bitter…
• I have always liked GB Shaw and can recommend Candida in addition to your recent successes although its presently not on anywhere
• I occasionally pretend to be Alan Bennett by inserting the words ‘wireless’ and ‘doily’ into a sentence
• I am always genuinely thrilled when you comment on my posts (like the National posters one which I have committed to memory). It creates an intake of breath like watching your child walk for the first time or looking at that photo of John Barrowman on Holy Moly
• Schadenfreude is my favourite word too
• As you have noted, I’m a martyr to pedantry
• Yesterday I stood behind Janet Henfrey in Tesco Covent Garden and can tell you what sort of cheese she bought
• I don’t have any direct celebrity friends, but I have a friend who is the boyfriend of the son of Maggie Smith’s gardener and he once made her a quiche

And if all that doesn’t convince you, then if you show me the place you wear your diamonds, I’ll show you mine…

The West End Whingers look forward to welcoming Graham to the party providing he:

1. bring along the recipe for the quiche and
2. deliver on his promise to dish the dirt on Janet Henfrey’s taste in cheese and
3. promise never to start his own theatre blog.

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