Posted the blog without finishing-1st time bloggers mistake

Okay so I didn't finish the last blog as I didn't finish writing about my week. On Sunday the 25th I went to go and see 'The Great Game' theatre festival at the Tricycle theatre which was 12 plays about Afghanistan. It was a fantastic festival with some great plays. One of the best was about the assassination of Massoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance. It also contained key testimonials from experts on Afghanistan and how the current situation can be improved. President Obama has set a deadline of July 2011 for troop withdrawal from Afghanistan but where will this leave the country?

So Monday I went out with the lovely Carly and we saw the BP Portrait Prize at the National Portrait Gallery which was excellent. There were some fantastic portraits which show yet again that painting is not a dead medium in a digital age. Everyone should go and see it.

Then on a whim, we went to see big haired Nicholas Cage in Bad Lieutenant at the Prince Charles. It is probably one of the weirdest films I have seen but also excellent. It is a marmite film where you either love it or hate it. Nicholas Cage takes more drugs in the film than Withnail drinks. He also does not seem to drink or eat anything. He beats up an old woman but you still like him. A powerhouse performance which I recommend everyone to go and see.

Today has been the lazy day! We were going to have dirty chicken but we did not succumb. We are such strong people! Have at last posted the Lovefilm discs back which feels like a phenomenal achievement! They have been staring at me for 3-4 months but now I have watched them. One of them was the first episode of Cracker which was excellent-Robbie Coltrance is sublime! Watch it!

A great day where I have beaten the curse of Lovefilm discs-such a triumph!

The Cultural Week - July 19th-25th

What a week it has been. The big 27 has finally been reached so I am in the late twenties now. I am going to argue that it is the late mid twenties until I am 29 years and 364 days old though.

Went to see 'After the Dance' by Terrence Rattigan at the National which was really good. It was about the post WW1 generation (The Bright Young Things) and how they deal with the realities of 1939. The jaded main character becomes idealistic for awhile before being crushed and returning to his destructive ways at the end. I wondered if Rattigan was writing a character piece or if the characters has allegorical / metaphorical significance. When I thought of the metaphorical significance, it made the power of the characterization weaker so I'm just going to look at it as a character piece.

On the Thursday after my birthday, went to see 'The Lion King' musical which was great fun and had a wonderful use of costumes and puppetry. Really want to go and see Warhorse now.

On Saturday we went to go and 'Comedy of Errors' at The Regents Park Open Air theatre which were exchange tickets for last year when we watched actors in the rain before they called it off. It is one of Shakespeare's earliest plays and was a great comedy all about mixed identities. The use of verse was excellent and the empirical North African setting was sublime. It was basically a Casablanca / Indian Raj rip-off in its staging and the company used songs from the periods + musical numbers which really engaged the audience. It was a fantastic example of contextualizing the text and making it fun and accessible-something Shakespeare would have wanted.