Dr Who

Ghosts from Fringes Past

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Just a quickie (oo, matron)! It’s late but I feel like sharing….

The Blueswater at The Jazz Bar on Friday night were awesome, as expected. I rolled up shortly after showtime (come on, how often are these times accurate?) and was warned it was pretty busy inside – I was even given the opportunity to pop down and check out whether I wanted to commit to going in (there was a £10 entry charge), nice offer but I’d just go for it. Hell, the weather was really bad, I wasn’t going to have a wasted soaking.

It was very busy, but at least towards the back the floor is higher, allowing a better view. I could be wrong but I think there’s a grand piano on the stage, it takes up a lot of space – I was only able to see the heads and shoulders of the band (no dandruff) but I assume it’s still there, otherwise the close huddle of five of the band would just be weird. It kinda looked like they’d all ganged up against the drummer and were refusing to go anywhere near him. Okay, so that was my brain having fun, like, one scenario, Simon was letting loose some lethal gases! (Yes, that’s Simon Gibb, buccaneer and back-up crew) Haha, going along with that line, when Nicole Smit joined them for a couple of numbers, the huddle made her stand closest to him!

Plenty of classic blues was the order of the night and Felipe Schrieberg has the voice and presence to deliver them. Such a great night! Oh, and special mention for their rendition of The Wizard, wow, so, so good. And now, from a wizard to a doctor…

Oh my giddy aunt, how good was Dr Who on Saturday evening? Bloody awesomely good, that’s how good. RTD really threw everything into this episode including an old companion, a very old adversary and a Lethbridge-Stewart! Neil Patrick Harris was perfect to play the Toymaker, the man is such a great performer (apparently he was the first to play Hedwig on Boadway, god, I would love to have seen that!) With RTD back at the helm it was a great story, great script, so many digs at the state of humankind, wonderful – “the lies, the righteousness – that’s human, that’s you …… and hating each other? You’ve never needed any help with that.” He’s right, you know.

Hurrah, we met the latest incarnation of the good Doctor, and what’s this? David Tennant‘s Doctor is still among us, could he make further appearances along the line?! Who cheered with me when Donna stood up to the creepy dolls and bashed the mother doll against the wall? I’m shuddering again just thinking of her babbies; old dolls and puppets are always up to no good when they turn up on anything! The companion show Doctor Who: Unleashed had an interesting section on the filming of the puppet scenes, but I was amused that our guide seemed so unaware about how big puppetry is these days – okay so not huge, but there’s always puppetry of some ilk at every Edinburgh Fringe.

And on that note, yay! Boris and Sergey are back in Edinburgh Boris and Sergey’s Christmas Cabaret on at the Assembly Roxy until 21st December. Two hours of darkly delicious humour, macabre mayhem, oh yeah, I’m going. It’s been a while since I saw them at the Fringe, ah, not since 2016! The first time was in 2012, then 2013, those shows were both at the Pleasance Courtyard; in 2016 they had a new home, the perfect stage for them, the Omnitorium a wonderful, strange, unsettling little world on its own, set slightly away from George Square Garden. They have been back since then, but you know, so many shows to choose from!

Anyhoo, it’s very late now, I must off to bed. Sweet dreams!

A bit about Elsie, a bit about Eileen

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Just twenty-one days to go until Logan’s Close play the Liquid Room, yay. Tonight they’re playing at Purple Weekend in León, lucky Spaniards! I’ve noticed on Instagram that former band member Alex Palmer will be on drums. Well, trying to round up five musicians all at once can be tricky! Worse than cats. The Liquid Room gig won’t have Stuart on bass but original bassist Olly is stepping in, sweet.

So will I be jigging around to any sounds tonight? Oh yes, The Blueswater are making a rare appearance at The Jazz Bar tonight at nine. If I’m not ready to head caveward after that, there’s the Moanin’ Bones at Whistlebinkies at midnight (well, so Binkies’ calendar says). Feels like ages since I was last out, three weeks is a long time without live music for me. Oh, I was out at the cinema the other night to see Eileen.

It’s an odd movie, left me feeling slightly on edge, on the disturbed side of bemused. The wonderfully ethereal Thomasin McKenzie plays the title character Eileen, a young woman stuck in small town 1960s Massachusetts; she works in a correctional facility for teenage boys and lives with her alcoholic ex-cop father. This young lady spends a lot of time fantasising, fantasies that escape on to the screen leaving the viewer unsure each time, then one day into her life comes a stunning blonde – is this ringing any alarm bells for you too? I wanted to yell, stay away from her, girly, stay away!

She doesn’t. She is utterly bewitched by Rebecca, the new psychologist at the facility. To be honest I was too, come on, Anne Hathaway with a blonde bouffant hairdo! She looked so different and clearly relished the part, enigmatic, independent 60s female, so Rebecca maybe had a screw slightly loose, quirky?! Both actresses were great as ever, there’s a real chemistry between their characters in this dark kinda noir thriller.

No other movies or musical interludes planned for this weekend. I suppose I should get on with present buying and festooning Old Hummus with tinsel. Of course, there’s Dr Who tomorrow evening, I’m so enjoying this little trio of Tennant treats; and last week’s with Mr Cribbins ❤️ oh, my heartses! My eyes may have gotten a tad moist.

Yay, next week is a Scat Rats double, midnight Tuesday in Binkies and seven on Thursday in Stramash. Dr Salad (Scott’s other band) will also in Binkies on Tuesday, hitting the crowd with some saucy, heavy romantic vibes. That’s about it for me until after my Christmas trip to Yorkshireland. Oh no, must grab a ticket for Jed Potts’ Blue Christmas 2023 on the 20th, it was so good last year. Blues fans in Edinburgh, get yourselves in the Christmas spirit at this wonderful event – and the proceeds go to charity!

Anyhoo, time to spruce up for the Jazz Bar. Toodle pip!

A windy day even before the sprouts!

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Hello, my fine friends! I hope you had a lovely Christmas, or few days, depending how you roll. So did I rise at 9? Was Arthur’s Seat busy? Not quite and not at all, but I did make it!

See, there I am!

Right at the very top was a group of Japanese and Aussie students who wanted a photo taking, so I offered my services in return for a photo of myself. It was extremely windy up there, I was almost blown off the trig point! Luckily for me a lady was stood next to it and I managed to brace my leg against her arm when a gust tried to tug me off (she was very understanding, phew!). This was the best photo out the few snapped. At the time I just trusted that there’d be something useable taken, said my thank yous and headed down to calmer levels. As it’s not the most exciting pic I’ve funked it up on my Facebook, a collage of alien vistas, well, its nearly Dr Who time again.

Speaking of Dr Who, I felt like the Face of Boe on Christmas Day! Some clever clogs rigged up a large screen in a corner of the lounge at mater’s, so that they could include me in the family party by Skype – to the extent of making me join in Charades and quizzes where they’d hold up the question cards to the screen for me to take a proper turn in a team! I did serenade them with a few Christmas tunes on my ukulele while they ate. I’d already eaten a rather good Christmas lunch with a slice of my wonderful cake to follow. Bet my cake was better than theirs!

I shall love you and leave you with Me & My Christmas Lunch …

Happy Not-Quite-New Year!

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Hello, dear friends! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy Hogmanay wherever you are! My family Christmas was fine, thanks, until a nasty little coughing lurgy attached itself to me somewhere amidst all the farewell hugs in the last days before I journeyed back North.

I soldiered on, went back to work to earn my crust, ignoring how my whole body shuddered at each cough. Hogmanay was spent by the fireside with a hot toddy watching the telly til after the bells, well, there was no point going to bed earlier – those fireworks are very loud and they went on longer than ever this year!

New Year’s Day morn I rose with one mission, to climb the Seat That Belongs To Arthur, no lurgy was going to hold me back. And, by George, Andrew and Murgatroyd, it didn’t!! My adrenaline pumping, my dander up, I was gonna scale that Seat or die in the attempt. Dear reader, I nearly did! (thank goodness I had my emergency hipflask of Laphroaig to revive me)

Since then I’ve been confined to bed and fireside, but am starting to feel much better now, so I thought I’d drop you a line. Expect stuff soon on Dr Who, Dracula and Dark Materials, also some Tuck and squirrels’ nuts.

Yours truly on reaching the top…

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And after a reviving glug or three of Laphroaig…..

20200101_141459

Who?

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Yes, I am referring to the new Doctor, Jodie Whittaker (just had to check that – one t or two, it’s one of those awkward names like Paterson), a Yorkshire lass and a fine actress. I do wonder if she can conjure up that otherworldly quirk of the Doctor, but so far since the Doc’s revival the choices have all been great, unlike some of the later reincarnations in the first run! And changing the Master into Missy was worked so well, Michelle Gomez was magnificent, so it’s not like the Doctor is the first timelord to change sex.

So, I got to wondering last night whether, in years gone by, did a young aspiring Jodie ever appear in a Fringe production? No, I don’t know, but I like the thought that maybe I saw the future Dr Who in a Fringe production. Maybe there’s a future Doctor performing this year, who knows?! Ok, so if you’re not a Who fan you may not be so tickled by this idea, but imagine if watching a Bond movie it dawned on you that you once saw Daniel Craig in a tiny fringe venue in a production of Bouncers? All famous actors began somewhere so why not at the Fringe?

The Fringe also has plenty of old luvvies at the other end of their careers. Well, when I say end I don’t mean, erm, oops, just not spring chickens anymore?! Rodney Bewes is back yet again, can’t keep him away! Twenty years ago he turned up with a little boat he’d built himself to do Three Men in a Boat (afterwards he was signing copies of the paperback, I still have mine!) and I don’t think he’s missed a year since. Some years later he left the boat at home and put on Diary of a Nobody, the last few years he’s been regaling his audiences with his own life story, forever a Likely Lad, a lovely gent.

And back into the Who-verse, Sylvester McCoy is popping up this year to do a new comedy play – you can’t keep an old dogter down (sorry), or their companions, 2014 saw Katie Manning at the Fringe. She and Susan Penhaligon played two aging actresses in a retirement home, a charming bittersweet play. Katie Manning played Jo Grant the first companion I really remember and I suspect I wasn’t the only one there because of old memories!

Oo, and if all the brouha over the latest Doctor has amused you, check out Jodie Whittaker is Doctor Who by the Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre on YouTube, it may just tickle you.