BENJAMIN COOPER

A body on the line

8th September 2009 | 0 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

I've just simultaneously done something I'm quite proud of and which has almost managed to annoy me to death. I've spent more time in the last week running than seemingly anything else, having  just joined a gym. I'm proud of myself for having joined a gym, something I've resisted for a long time, but I have been at the same time irritated by the contradictions it has brought to the...

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A good ol’ West End boozer

5th August 2009 | 0 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

Hilarity has ensued recently as that most modern British cultural event, binge drinking, has combined with another, the West End musical. Now, I'm an enormous fan of both, so I'm loathe to criticise either. But there is something particularly brilliant about the response of the West End producers, who, having spent millions of pounds shamelessly trying to persuade busloads of Karen-Matthews-in-make-up clones to come through their doors, are now complaining...

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Young, gifted and white middle class

15th July 2009 | 0 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

I remember when being a man, being white and being middle class were all things that both separately and in combination one could be happily ashamed of. Yes - I'm white - but I support racial equality, we would be forced to say. Yes - I'm a man - but I'm no misogynist and I'm not even boorish. Yes - I'm middle class - but I don't look down on...

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Separation Anxiety

4th June 2009 | 1 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

I am not one to judge actors, and I won't. So here I'll...comment... on them. There's been a story which has been reported in every edition of The Stage for an interminably long time which has become known (to me) as 'The Big Bad Agency Affair'. Essentially, a handful of actors have left a leading theatrical agency after two of their best agents ran off to set up their own...

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No work and All Plays: Expenses

21st May 2009 | 1 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

My expenses this week:

Play - National Theatre Bookshop - £7.99
Various sandwiches - Sainsbury's/Tescos/Somerfield - £10
Crisps and assorted sustenance - Sainsbury's/Tescos/Somerfield - £3
Gaffer tape  - An undisclosed venue that wasn't looking - free
Replacing the prop that I dropped in my pint - Some mad shop in Soho - £14.99

I will, of course, be claiming them all off myself. But I'll flip them so when I claim them the first time I'll...

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No Work and All Plays: First to the bar

13th May 2009 | 1 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

Of all the bars in all the world, the theatre bar is best, providing pre and post-theatre entertainment since drama began. Let's start backstage, as it were, behind the bar. The barman/woman falls into one of two categories: aspiring/failed/between jobs actor/actress or, barman who's been there since it was a football pub and hasn't been able to find another job. The acting barperson is cheerful with a hint of menace,...

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No Work and all Plays: Audience Issues

27th April 2009 | 0 comments | 0 votes yet, click here to agree or disagree

Anthony and Cleopatra – Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory, Bristol

As I walked out of A&C for a post-show fag, I overheard a conversation between two old men, ‘and of course, in Shakespeare’s days all the actors would be boys.’ Which was followed by a pursed-lipped exchange of smiles and raised eyebrows. That was a good one. I don’t know if anyone’s said this already, but in the same way that...

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