Review – Mr Foote’s Other Leg, Hampstead Theatre

We must declare an interest of sorts.

Ian Kelly, who wrote this play, Mr Foote’s Other Leg, once generously donated two of the drawings that he created live on stage in The Pitman Painters as a charity raffle prize for a The West End Whingers’ party. Remember those days? We do. But only just.

Based on Kelly’s own award-winning biography (which goes by the same name – and why wouldn’t it? It’s a nifty title) of Samuel Foote, 18th century actor, impressionist, comedian, satirist, warm up man, pamphleteer, female impersonator, playwright, theatre manager of The Haymarket and writer of the first true-crime bestseller. He also, rather carelessly lost a leg, but that wasn’t to lead to his downfall. Other events led to that.

Review – Stephen Ward, Aldwych Theatre

When Phil asked Andrew if he fancied trailing along with him to the new “PG advised” Andrew Lloyd Webber musical “play with songs”, Stephen Ward, he replied, “I hope I’m not too Stephen”.

Phil, unusually, understood Andrew instantly. New cockney rhyming slang for ennui. It will no doubt form a regular part of our lexicon.

Hard to believe it’s getting on for 4 years since the Whingers visited the composer’s last show and inadvertently caused something akin to a minor rumpus.

But this in not the behemoth of Love Never Dies. This take on the Profumo Affair – following Stephen Ward’s part in the scandal and the common consent that the establishment used him a scapegoat – is a decidedly small scale offering by comparison.

Review – The Last of the Duchess, Hampstead Theatre

If you are disposed to think about the Duchess of Windsor, you might think about the abdication, those years in exile in France and the Queen Mum’s froideur towards her.

Then again you might be of a mind to muse on her supposed oral dexterity and question those allegations given her propensity for sporting pearl necklaces.

But then doubting different versions of events is key to the tale presented by playwright Nicholas Wright.

Review – Betty Blue Eyes, Novello Theatre

You may wonder, should you luxuriate in having too much time on your hands and nothing better to do with it, what the Whingers have in common.

Andrew tries manfully to do his bit to save the planet. Phil finds it a bit of a chore but does find the recycling bin a useful over-flow receptacle for his umpteen empty wine bottles.

Andrew is vegetarian. Phil regards a bacon sandwich as the perfect hangover cure believing Andrew would cope better if he just got some meat inside him.

There you are, very little congruity between the Whingers really. Andrew would of course be on the side of the pig, Betty Blue Eyes, while Phil would be imagining the smell of bacon sizzling over his ring.

Review – Welcome to Thebes, National Theatre

The Whingers were inspired to smuggle their recently purchased vuvuzela trumpets about their persons as they entered the Olivier auditorium on Tuesday evening.

Hard to believe, isn’t it, but they had actually watched the footie on Saturday night, missing England’s only goal as ITV HD’s useless coverage switched to an ad break just at the key moment, which of course meant the whole farrago was even duller than they could have possibly imagined.

But if Welcome to Thebes proved as dreary at least the Whingers would be able to whip out their horns and liven things up.

Review – Private Lives, Vaudeville theatre

The Whingers were a bit slow off the mark with this Private Lives. They saw the excellent production at Hampstead last year and weren’t sure they had the puissance for yet another PL, this despite Phil being quite a fan of Kim Cattrall in Sex and the City* – the TV series of course, not the disappointing, past its sell-by date film.

Andrew of course knows nothing of such televisual things and only warms up his valves if there is the promise of a Time Lord, a Marple or a bonnet. And it wasn’t even the glowing 4 and 5 star reviews that really lured them in to the Vaudeville Theatre.

Review – The Last Cigarette, Trafalgar Studios

Famously the Whingers never indulge in any form of artificial stimulation although there are those who have attached soubriquets to them that might suggest otherwise.

Theatre is really the only nasty habit to which they have ever become addicted. But unlike alcohol, nicotine, illegal substances and caffeine not only does it fall short of the epithet of “stimulant”,  it often fails even to keep the Whingers awake.

But it was fitting that the Whingers dropped in to see The Last Cigarette last night for health had been something of a topic for the day.