THEGAYUK

Category: Review

  • THEATRE REVIEW | Fleabag: Epically Entertaining and Daringly Dirty

    ★★★★★ | Fleabag

    Fleabag is a kind of play where you are unsure of what you will be watching. Especially as the sign on the theatre entrance read: ‘Warning: References to sex’.

    Fleabag is a one-woman sixty-minute show that portrays the life of one young woman in the most hilarious, sympathetic and filthy fashion. Loved it. It starts in an interview setting, and then it trails off to her hot encounters and her needing to take ‘hot’ photos of herself to please her many admirers. ‘Take A Dirty Picture For Me’ comes to mind.

    It all happens in the space of 48 hours, and whilst it is funny in the writing, it shows great depth when the theme of feminism is introduced in an almost caricature way. Maddie Rice played the role master-mindedly. She makes her character appear ‘laddish’ and pertaining to be a player.

    Though many things she did and said were crude and filthy, if a bloke said and did the same things as Maddie, to his ‘blokey’ mates, no one would batter an eyelid. But because it was a female, some audience members cringed with discomfort.

    Maddie Rice plays the unnamed character with utter and sheer brilliance. Her wit and humour were 10/10. It was that funny that I thought I had booked tickets to see a stand-up comedian at ‘Live at the Apollo’ show. Maddie really captured the role as written by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, with precision and dedication. It felt as though the role was written for her.

    Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s writing was a delicious treat to our ears, and a true and daring piece of work that was worthy of the full-house show it received.

  • FILM REVIEW | The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

    After my recent visit to Auschwitz, watching a film about The Holocaust might not seem like such a great idea. However, I remember this film coming out in the cinema, and wanting to watch it – but never quite got round to it. ★★★★★

    And thanks to the wonders of Netflix, I have now seen it – and wept! The film is based on the book by John Boyne, and follows the adventures of an 8-year-old boy, Bruno. The son of a high-ranking Nazi, you don’t really get a sense of what his father does and it doesn’t seem to impact on his son and his friends as they play at being pilots (remember using your arms as wings, running around pretending to be a plane?)

    The only sing that something is odd is when his father gets a promotion and this upsets Bruno’s life, shifting his mother, sister and father to an undisclosed location. The new house is beautiful, very modern for the 40s and lots of rooms to play in, leaving Bruno to choose his bedroom and the view of the “farm”. When questioned, his father finally explains to his wife the true nature of the new posting. The odd smell… the strange hired help.

    And then Bruno goes exploring and encounters the boy in the striped pyjamas, Shmuel. This is where this film comes into its own; the viewpoint of an 8-year-old. In their world, nothing’s nasty, nothing’s fatal, in their world food is found, no-one starves, lost relatives can be found, someone on the other side of a fence can still play games, lying doesn’t have major consequences, summer is endless and life is beautiful.

    Or is it?

    Whilst we see what is happening around them, their own wide eyed world view is based on what is in front of them, no wider picture, nothing bad happens. And that’s what makes this film unique, the two main characters are children and we see things through their eyes.

    When Shmuel loses his father, Bruno offers to help and a simple plan is put in place… with consequences. I wont spoil it for you, but stock up on tissues.

    The two main characters are amazing in this film, understated performances and totally believable. Asa Butterfield who plays Bruno is all wide eyed Arian with an 8-year-old’s simplistic world view. He has all the benefits of being of the right genetic stock, and still doesn’t understand just yet what’s going on, whilst his family can see the other side and his mother suffers a near breakdown when she realises whats going on.

    Jack Scanlon plays Shmuel and is so believable, they caught him at the right time, skinhead with missing teeth, he excels in the part as a camp inmate. The script is pitch perfect, the costumes spot on and the sets are believable, having seen the wooden stables the Nazis used to house inmates in Auschwitz-Birkenau, and the bunks use to house 2 or 3 inmates at a time, this really is faultless.

    Watch this film if you can, read the book, then read up on the subject – get an understanding on this subject. Visit the Holocaust Educational Trust site and support their work: www.het.org.uk

    Available to buy from Amazon

  • FILM REVIEW | Erebus: Into The Unknown

    ★★★★ | Erebus: Into The Unknown

    In 1979 257 people perished in an Air New Zealand flight in which an aircraft slammed into Mount Erebus in Antarctic, becoming one of the world’s worst air disasters.

    The flight was a sightseeing excursion that left Auckland in the morning and was expected to return that evening. Sightseeing tours were a new and exciting breakthrough in the world of air-based tourism. Passengers were treated to breath-taking views, being wined and dined as a sub-zero, frozen world passed seamlessly beneath them.

    When the DC10 aircraft failed to return alarm bells started to go off and operation Overdue was mounted. Within hours the lives of thousands of people would be changed forever, in New Zealand’s worst aviation accident to date. The nation was in shock for 200 of its citizens that died. Countless families, friends and a nation mourned for those lost on the inhospitable mountain side.

    In this film, the story focuses on eleven ordinary police officers who were called upon to retrieve the shattered bodies of those victims. Eleven ordinary men who faced an extraordinary harrowing and life-changing battle against the bleak, forbidding landscape that forms Mount Erbus experiencing mass death on a massive scale.

    Operation Overdue was the New Zealand police operation to lead a recovery operation. The first of these officers left from Christchurch on the 29th November 1979. It included the Chief Air Accident Investigator, Ron Chippindale, who led the site investigation, and the New Zealand Police search and rescue coordinator, Inspector Robert (Bob) Mitchell, who led the recovery operation. Just 11 New Zealand Police officers were selected from squads that included members of the Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) team and Search and Rescue. Accompanying these men was a handful of mountaineers. By the 10th of December, their job of recovering, bagging and repatriated bodies was complete. The DVI managed to recover 114 intact bodies, 133 bags of human remains and countless personal belonging back to the victims’ families.

    Using a mix of archive and re-enactment, Directors Peter Burger and Charlotte Purdy have created a powerful documentary that uncovers the power of the human spirit. That even against the greatest odds, courage can overcome fear.

    Although short, this documentary film manages to capture the emotional rollercoaster faced by those directly involved with the disaster.

  • RESTAURANT REVIEW | Bistrot on the Square @ Eccleston Square Hotel

    Bistrot on the Square @ Eccleston Square Hotel

    Just a brief walk from the chaos of Victoria Station lies the calm, stylish, uber-cool and uber-tech hotel within Eccleston Square. I am not a natural-born Londoner and can sometimes find the “buzz” a bit overwhelming. Eccleston Square manages to create an ambience to instantly chill and transports you to a peaceful place.

    Ambient music played throughout even fed through to their guest toilet decked with L’occitane products (as are there hotel rooms), and fresh hand towels. It’s simple luxuries like this that take the experience to another level.

    From the moment you walk through the door, it’s clear that presentation and design is key and comes easily to the Eccleston Square Hotel. It was lovely to see this being held consistently and conveyed through their food with each course being presented to perfection in the Bistrot.

    To start we had spiced squid & prawn fritters with sweet chilli sauce. Brilliantly bestowed on top of a newspaper cutting of an article about the Eccleston Square Hotel. It felt like we had constant smiles on our faces as the Bistrot laid on a dining experience to remember.

    Also to start, a salad of burrata (made from mozzarella & cream), parma ham, and walnut balsamic dressing. Burrata. Where have you been all my life? I often find mozzarella out of place in salads or anything where it’s not molten and hot essentially. But burrata solves that by giving the creamy-ness of mozzarella but being silky and smooth, and melts in the mouth- a perfect partner for the parma ham.

    Next, the traditional fish (3 different types) and spinach Xacuti Indian curry. Spicy, warming and as vibrant in it’s flavour as it is colour. Served along side steamed cumin rice and fantastic shards of poppadum. A lovely dish.

    Also we had the Moroccan spiced lamb and apricot tagine. The lamb was amazing. Trouble with tagines’ can be that they are overly fruity, or too much spice added- but the chef, clearly is very good with spices as it was a perfect marriage of fruity and spicy along-side luxuriously tender lamb. With the lamb you have a refreshing raw slaw of tomato, cucumber, and pomegranate in a mint dressing, which was so lovely and in-line with the chef’s nutritious, vitamin-rich approach to food, adding some needed crunch against tender lamb and warm fluffy lemon couscous. My only criticism would be that the tomato was slightly watery so took away from the crisp crunch.

    To finish, I had the Madagascan vanilla crème brulee. It was literally the best brulee I have ever had. It was fresh and spiked with vanilla pod throughout it’s set, warm custard. I don’t know how many brulees are spoilt by the custard being cold so that it conjours images of brulee en masse sat in a fridge waiting for a customer to order them and be blow-torched. Not this one. Simple, but beautiful when done right, as they have done here. The Valhrona fondant is one to order too with an intense chocolate hit bound to surpass the requirements of any chocolate lover.

    Post dinner coffees are served with home-made biscuits which was a lovely little touch and executed well. The service throughout was impeccable and friendly with our waiter engaging in polite conversation, asking what we had done in the day etc. he also ensured our courses came within our time-frame due to travel commitments.

    I have given the Bistrot on the Square five stars as they demonstrated being experts in my two favourite loves; design and food. And being able to do so with such grace and good taste is hard to find.

    Reviewed by: Jordan Lohan
    ADDRESS: 37 Eccleston Square Hotel, London, SW1V 1PB
    VENUE PHONE: 020 3489 1000
    WEBSITE: http://www.ecclestonsquarehotel.com
    PRICE: £££
    RATING: ★★★★★
    TIPPING POLICY: Discretionary service charge of 12.5% added to bill

  • FILM REVIEW | Big Eyes, A Radical Departure For Burton

    ★★★ | Big Eyes

    In a rather radical departure from his last few very edgy movies acclaimed director Tim Burton has opted to make a biopic about Walter Keane the infamous plagiarist who in the 1950s claimed that his wife’s populist art was his own work. It’s a colourful lightweight drama that never gets dark even when Keane’s trickery is exposed, thanks mainly to the entertaining performances of its stars Christoph Waltz and Amy Adams.

    The movie opens with a blond-wigged Margaret Ulbrich leaving her unseen husband and taking just Jane her young daughter, a suitcase and a handful of her artwork. Her destination is San Francisco’s new trendy hotspot North Beach but getting a job as a newly single mother is not easy and so she supplements her income at the furniture factory where she works by setting up shop at an outdoor art fair. Her signature style of painting forlorn looking children with enormous soulful eyes doesn’t attract many sales but it does attract the attention of the garrulous older man in the next booth who is pitching his pictures of street scenes of Paris.

    A compulsive womaniser, Walter Keane turns on the charm for Margaret and she, still feeling vulnerable and lonely after her recent separation, agrees to go out on a date with him. The couple hardly know other when Margaret receives a letter from her husband’s lawyer threatening to sue for custody of their child, and so she accepts Walter’s spontaneous marriage proposal to safeguard her chances of holding onto Jane.

    After they return from a romantic wedding and honeymoon in Hawaii, Walter starts hawking their art around town and despite the fact he is a sharp fast-talking salesman, the best deal he can come up with is renting a couple of walls in a Jazz club to display their work. His Montmartre street scenes are totally overlooked but when the club patrons spot Margaret’s soulful eyed children and want to buy them all, he claims that they are all his own work too.

    Margaret is somewhat infatuated with her new husband who she credits with giving her a new lease of life, so when she discovers the lie she goes along it. She is persuaded by Walter that having a man as the artist, is the only way to successful sell the art. He also manages to charm everyone into helping him make this new venture so successful including the San Francisco Examiner reporter Dick Nolan who plants stories about Walter and the art in his newspaper’s society pages.

    As their success explodes all Margaret has to do is stay at home and churn out more paintings in complete secrecy as even Jane, now a teenager, must not be allowed to know the truth. When Walter hits on the notion of printing cheap poster copies of Margaret’s kitsch art the public cannot enough of them, and one of the very few dissenting voices is that of the New York Times Art Critic John Canady who denounces them to the world.

    When his sheer greed turns Walter into a real menace, then Margaret finally packs up her suitcases once again and flees with her daughter, but this time to Hawaii. It takes Walter a year to track her down and when he calls her bluff about exposing him as a fraud, she finally goes public with the fact that she is the real artist. A supremely over-confident Walter immediately denounces these claims in the Examiner, but for once he has misread Margaret who is no longer frightened of him, and so she promptly sues him and the newspaper for slander.

    The judge clears the newspaper of any liability at the Trial but when the rest of the proceedings degenerate into a public squabble between the couple, he deems the only way to resolve the true authorship of the Art is that both of the Keanes paint a picture there and then.

    The chemistry between Waltz as the obnoxiously charming con-man and Adams as the pretty put-upon vulnerable Margaret with her fine Christian morals is what makes this story seem so believable even when it’s hard to even begin to conceive that all this appalling art could have resulted in amassing such a fortune. Burton makes this adaption of this true story an incisive commentary on how early 1960’s society even in a consumer-driven California still had these impenetrable expectations of what women could do.

    This easy going movie will hardly rank as one of director Burton’s best but it is reasonably entertaining and easy on the eye and to that end we should give credit to the design team for the locations, the sets and costumes that were all so perfect down to the last detail.

  • FILM REVIEW | Wild, Witherspoon Shines With Talent

    ★★★★★ | Wild

    After her cancer-ridden mother died just aged 45, Cheryl Strayed fell to pieces. Heavily in debt and with her marriage disintegrating she developed an obsession for sleeping with countless strangers and an addiction to heroin. Her solution to finding a path to recovery and do some major soul-searching was deciding to hike alone the entire Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) that stretches some 2663 miles from California right up into Canada.

    The stunning scenic route takes in some extreme terrain such as the unforgiving heat of Mojave Desert and the deep snowdrifts of the Sierra Nevada. Even though the rigours of the PCT has defeated many experienced hikers, completely green newbie Cheryl was convinced that she nevertheless would succeed. However, on day one, she could barely lift her heavy backpack that she had stuffed it with too many things that she would eventually realise were unnecessary for this arduous journey.

    As she starts the long hike northward Cheryl discovers that as she can barely manage 5 miles per day, she will never walk anything like the whole distance in the 3 months she had estimated. She also quickly discovers that she has the wrong gas for her primus stove so her diet now has to consist of cold mushy oatmeal and dried fruit. Racked with pain and a body full of red sores and a pair of bloody feet, Cheryl has to fight hard not to give into her inner voice that keeps telling her she can quit anytime.

    With only the occasional rattlesnake and her well-worn poetry books to keep her company and relieve the tedium and the agony, she can hardly contain herself when she finally encounters a fellow hiker en route even though the advice he imparts to her both encourages and scares her rigid at the same time. By now it has really dawned on her that she is woefully unprepared for such a massive undertaking. The only thing that seems to sustain her besides her sheer stubbornness, is a real need to ‘find’ herself again.

    Director Jean-Marc Vallee armed with a script by Nick Hornby fills the journey based on Cheryl Strayed’s own memoir with flashbacks of her tumultuous and troubled past which help us understand her determination to make this trip work. Bobbi her working class mother had suffered at the hands of a physically abusive husband which somehow never dented her sheer optimism and just before her untimely death she had gone back to college to get the education she had missed out on as a child. The bond between Bobbi and Cheryl, who was just 22 years old when her mother died, was the most important thing in both these women’s lives and the reason why the death propelled Cheryl so quickly into a downward spiral.

    When Cheryl reaches the first town along the PCT which is a resting place for all hikers, she retrieves a care package that her ex-husband has mailed c/o the local Post Office. She also discovers that word has got out about her and her oversized backpack has been nicknamed ‘The Monster’ but it also elicits advice on how to discard half its contents to make it more practical.

    As a lone woman on the Trail, Cheryl feels very susceptible and she views every man as a potential predator. One is a harmless roving reporter for the ‘Hobo Times’ who riles Cheryl up for insisting on calling her a hobo. Another is a kind farm worker who offers her a hot meal and a shower, and she even comes across a male hiker dipping naked in a stream who cannot get his clothes on quick enough when she appears. Her encounter with two hunters is however quite scary, but with quick thinking on her part Cheryl soon scrambles for safety.

    The stunning setting makes this heartbreaking journey such a visual treat, and the story of self-preservation of this doggedly determined troubled soul is one that will resound with so many people on so many levels. Reese Witherspoon, the movie’s star and producer optioned Cheryl Strayed’s book even before it was published and topped the NY Times Bestseller List as a vehicle for herself and to kickstart her career that has been in the doldrums since her Oscar win in 2005. It paid off big time as she totally immersed herself in the role and gave an impressive career-best performance as Strayed (even though she was 12 years older than her, and even odder still, just 9 years younger than Laura Dern who was electrifying as Bobbi her mother).

    The movie is bound to do more than just make us appreciate what a talented actress Ms Witherspoon really is, as it is also bound to inspire lots of other lost souls to buy themselves a pair of hiking boots and attempt this near-impossible journey, and maybe cause a ‘traffic jam’ or two along the P.C.T. in the future.

  • BOOK REVIEW | Dr.a.g

    ‘Dr.a.g. isn’t what you wear and it isn’t who you are. It’s how you wear who you are.’

    Drag (a man who is ‘dressed as a girl’) has become a diverse form of expression that challenges, entertains and educates by pushing boundaries, while embracing beauty, comedy and glamour. The performers in this illustrated book are evidence of that diversity, captured by some of the top photographers working in the world today. All of them have graciously donated their work to make the book possible. What started as a small independent film fundraiser has grown into this beautiful coffee-table book.

    Actor and author Christopher Logan launched the ‘dr.a.g.’ book a few years ago, but the project stalled when his original publisher fell into bankruptcy. Logan believed in the project, garnered a loan, and kept the existing distribution contracts. Logan is bringing back the glamour with photography books. In a world when the printed word is easily downloaded, the book that survives is the photo book. “You just cannot experience the vibrancy of these photographs online. They are meant for the printed page,” says Logan.

    The ‘Bookthefilm Edition’ features famous faces from Frank Marino, Jackie Beat and Lady Bunny to Joey Arias, Jeffree Star and Jim Bailey. Additionally, several portraits from noteworthy drag queen photographers are included in this book, including Magnus Hastings, Austin Young and more. The book also features everyone’s favourite queens from RuPaul’s Drag Race including Chad Michaels, Courtney Act, Yara Sofia, Roxxy Andrews, Detox, Akashia, Tammie Brown, Nina Flowers, Bebe Zahara Benet, Jujubee, Morgan McMichaels, Shannel, Ongina and Raja.

     

  • TV REVIEW | The Hotel, Sometimes it is best to leave a classic alone.

    ★★ | The Hotel

    Unfortunately, the new series of The Hotel fails to ignite any excitement but does raise questions on why bother to invest time and money in a programme that is as dull as the hotel’s carpet.

    When Mark and the hotel first checked on to our screens, it was fun, it was campy and was an hour of guilty pleasure television as former hotelier Mark Jenkins misdirected his team into more and more moronic situations. However, this time round Mark is stymied at every turn and the programme has become turgid and rather dull.

    This season sees Mark return to the Cavendish Hotel in Torbay, except this time, he’s not the boss; he’s the entertainment management. The roof is leaking and finances are at rock bottom. Desperate for a new lease of life, owners Vicky and Andy have agreed to take on the hapless Mark for the season as their new entertainment’s manager. Except the owners, Vicky and Andy won’t let Mark get on to it.

    You do have to question why on earth the owners would allow Mark, who has had three hotel disasters himself, take control of anything, especially entertainment, except to possibly bring attention to their ailing hotel.

    The programme makers say expect comedy and mishaps, but after watching an episode I’ve decided to take a pass on the rest of the series and check out.

  • BOOK REVIEW | Cross Country Daddy

    I have to admit I love the written word; I have a thing for it, which is strange as someone who is quite visual in their other work and trained in visual arts. I especially love it in erotica, simple sensuous phrases can have unexpected results and can prove more arousing than mere images – and that’s exactly what Jonathan Lemieux and his short story does.

    Just that one word ‘Daddy’ conjures up all sorts of images in the gay world… and this book doesn’t disappoint. The story is simple but full of such descriptive narrative. It gives you a hero of sorts, with a back-story and told in the first person so you feel part of the action.

    It follows our hero, Justin Waterston, on a journey of self-discovery and into the arms of his daddy, Mitch. He meets his hero online, and spends time on camera with his lusty counter-part.

    The relationship develops and, in time, the usual question rears its ugly head, the one about meeting in the flesh. I always find this amazing as only our generation must understand this – we’ve seen each other, hell, we’ve probably had sex online on camera but we’ve never met face to face.

    So Justin receives a ticket to ride, and ride he does!

    If you like your sex with a pinch of pig, if you like your erotica with a smidgeon of smut – Jonathan writes it just for you.

    This story has the desired effect in the pant department – it arouses and stimulates but also gives you characters you care about and want to know more about!

    I’m reliably informed that this is another in a long line of stories, so feel free to invest emotionally in these characters and storylines – think Harry Potter with a fetish and you wont be disappointed in this series!

    The story is available here as a download or an actual book:

    www.blurb.ca/b/5686764-cross-country-daddy?class=book-title

    store.blurb.ca/ebooks/502220-cross-country-daddy

    By Chris Jones

  • FILM REVIEW | Inherent Vice, Expecting Boogie Nights, you will be disappointed

    ★★★ | Inherent Vice, Expecting Boogie Nights, you will be disappointed

    The reclusive writer Thomas Pynchon is known for his dense and complex novels which he has never allowed to be adapted into movies, until now that is. When ‘Inherent Vice’ his seventh novel was published in 2009 the dust jacket proclaimed that it was ‘part-noir, part-psychedelic romp’.

    The piece is set in 1970 and unkempt Doc Spotello a Private Eye sporting big mutton chops and as usual in a dope-fuelled haze, is in his Gordetta Beach hangout when Shasta Fay Hepworth one of his ex-squeezes turns up unexpectedly to ask for his help. She wants him to track down her secret lover, big-shot land developer Mickey Wolfmann, who’s vanished. Shasta is worried that Mrs. Wolfmann who has her own lover, wants to commit her husband to a loony bin but before Doc can even start investigating, Shasta disappears too.

    When Doc gets on the case he heads out to Channel View Estates, Wolfmann’s latest cheesy housing development, and en route pops into a sex parlor there looking for one of the owner’s bodyguards who he thinks will be able to help him. As he gets ready to leave Doc is knocked out, only to wake up much later next to the body of the dead bodyguard, a burly Nazi-loving biker, and he is instantly accused of murder by the cops.

    Doc gets out of this particular mess as his old nemesis Det. ‘Bigfoot’ Bjornsen knows he is innocent but nevertheless he and the FBI press him into helping them locate Wolfmann and a missing musician Coy Harlington who they all want to talk to as well. And looming over everything is the ‘Golden Fang’ that Doc has been warned to avoid. What this is he is never quite sure, and neither are we. At first it appears it is maybe a blacklisted movie star’s personal sailing vessel, or one that belongs to an Indo-Chinese drug cartel. Or it may even be the name of a syndicate of tax-dodging dentists fronted by a coke-snorting Dr. Feelgood.

    Both Wolfmann and Hartigan are found but by this time the plot is so convoluted that we have no chance of making head of tale of it unless we are as perpetually stoned as Doc is. What makes this ‘haze’ so enjoyable however is the inspired and zany delicious humor that is always a strength of Anderson’s films, plus some rather wonderful performances from a fine cast led by Joaquin Phoenix as Doc. Phoenix brings his hallmark manic manner to the role and is excruciatingly wonderful as he totally lives a part that is so tailor-made for him.

    Fine turns too from Josh Brolin as Bigfoot, a barely recognisable Benicio Del Toro as a Lawyer, Owen Wilson (who is always happy when he is stoned) as Coy, and delightfully over-the-top performance by Martin Short as Dr Feelgood.

    If like me you were expecting this to follow on from Anderson’s 1997 breakthrough movie the sensational ‘Boogie Nights’ set in this same period, you will be disappointed as it’s simply not in the same league. It is however still a joy to watch and appreciate his highly personal stylised approach to filmmaking as he revels in a period and culture that he has such empathy with. Just make sure you read the novel first, and maybe take a puff or two as well.

  • BOOK REVIEW | No Drum To Beat

    ★★★★ | No Drum To Beat

    Mansel Stimpson, co-author of the Film Review yearbook, has written a memoir, a memoir where he states that ‘he was born in 1978 at the age of 40.’

    The Film Review yearbook is the world’s longest-established movie guide and is the only guide that provides essential credits and reviews for all theatrically released films in the UK. Stimpson began co-authoring the book in 2007, but his own memoir, titled ‘No Drum to Beat’, was actually written thirty years ago. It’s not about Mansel’s life as a writer, nor is it about film, it’s about him recognising his sexuality for the first time, at the age of 40, and then embracing it, and immediately seeing it as an opening to the possibility of loving.

    Mansel says that ‘when I recognised that I was gay I immediately saw it not as a problem but as a solution to a problem.’

    ‘No Drum to Beat’ tells an extraordinary and unique story of one man’s realisation that he was gay a bit late in life, but it’s also a record of gay life in London from 1978 to 1981, a time when London was going through a significant period of social change.

    Mansel mentions that his book ‘was written for men who thought being gay was a problem, and it’s also written for women and straight men in the hope of promoting greater understanding.’

    Mansel Stimpson has previously written for the British Federation of Film Societies, What’s On in London, Capital Gay, Gay Times, and the Pink Paper. Throughout his career he has interviewed countless singers, actors, conductors, and directors.