I then hot footed across the city centre to meet my friend Zoe for dinner in the pouring rain (my tactic of walk quickly and you won't get wet didn't work very well!). She had recommended that we eat at Safran on Kirkgate opposite the Duck & Drake Pub. Safran was really not at all pretentious in décor whilst being quite opulent at the same time. This would seem to be an oxymoron (love that word!), but it had huge wall murals and chairs with flowery upholstery with gold thread running through it. Zoe recommended a mixed starter which was HUGE and we also had some lamb kebabs. The starter came with two massive naan type breads which were tasty and really light and we dipped into hummus, aubergine dip, tzatziki type dip, a pea and potato salad and another dip that was green and tasty, but I can't remember what it was called!
I also had some Turkish Coffee and both of us had a glass of red wine. The bill came to only £29 for both of us which was amazing and the service was friendly, prompt and efficient. I would highly recommend Safran and Persian food makes a nice change.
We then walked over quickly to West Yorkshire Playhouse to see Guys and Dolls. It's the first time that I've been to the Playhouse (to watch a play - I interview candidates at the canteen there a lot!) probably for about 6/7 years. I think that the last play that I saw there was either Johnson over Jordon (which was amazing) or a production by the same people that did Guys and Dolls Leeds Amateur Operatic Society of Jesus Christ Superstar which one of our friends was in I think back in 2005.
Now my expectations were low - I don't tend to like musicals and I've never heard much about Guys and Dolls so hadn't an awareness of the plot, songs or characters. However, I was pleasantly surprised. The plot was easy to follow (I'm terrible with musicals as I don't listen to lyrics in songs first, I listen to the music which makes it hard for me to follow plot if there is too much song in a musical), the acting for an amateur production was good and the singing was pretty decent too. The costumes were a bit hit and miss, but it was certainly a colourful spectacle and amazingly I didn't fall asleep! I have a massive problem with falling asleep if watching cinema or theatre when in a darkened room! Helen managed to make a small faux pas in recognising the guy playing Sky Masterson who had slagged off one of her friends previously at Ok Karaoke and commenting on this to us. Unfortunately for Helen, some of his friends were sat directly in the row behind us - slightly awkward (they moved to another row after the interval).
Going to the theatre for the first time in ages then reminded me of one of my first theatre trips when I really was a 90s teenager. I went with my all girls school - Tiffin Girls School to see Dreams of Anne Frank in 1992. Going to an all girls school and being only 12 years old somewhat limited the opportunity to meet boys and so trips out were a thing to relish the chances of seeing members of the opposite (and usually more immature) sex. On this particular occasion, it wasn't so much the other schools watching the play that we were interested in, but the actor playing the part of - for want of a better description - Anne Frank's boyfriend - who was called Tim Matthews and was a whole 4 years older than us.
After we'd seen the play, conferred amongst ourselves we decided that we quite liked him and one of my particularly bold and resourceful friends found the number for the Polka Theatre from the phone book (this was B.G. - Before Google) and one lunch time four of us crowded around the pay phone in the school entrance hall and dialled the number. Amazingly someone naive or stupid put us through to this 16 year old actor and we giggled and chatted at him for as long as our 10ps would allow passing the phone back and forth to each other. We did this on several occasions until close to when the play was finishing up and he then gave us his home phone number and we would ring him there and either speak to him, or chat away to his very accommodating Mum. I have to point out that I was not the ring leader in this slightly scary stalking, but it did make lunchtimes a bit more amusing. Tim I don't think ever quite hit the big time, although I was very excited when I spotted him on an episode of my now favourite ever crime drama The Bill. It's strange the effect going to an all girls school has on your perception of the male species during your "formative" years. I think that this was definitely good training for a later crush and obsession with Take That the following year...
No comments:
Post a Comment