I cannot resist Spitting Image and The Way Old Friends Do in this theatre season at Birmingham Rep. Both shows were almost full house and captioned.
I was excited for the Spitting Image because of the characters on poster. To help myself enjoy the show, I watched some 80s footages of the programme on Youtube as a warm-up. Although I was young in those days, I feel like I watched the show, especially when I saw Margaret Thatcher. Unfortunately, I am quite disappointed because of the story plot is quite 'safe'. It is a shame that they just put President Xi aside as the audience like Prince Harry. Prince Harry had more lines that he was mainly promoting his book 'Spare'. Putin was the audience next to President Xi but he deserved a dance in the show. Volodymyr Zelenskyy was the only character did not involve in the 'idiots assemble' because he was busy fighting at war. I was expecting more sarcasm. Ok, it was interesting to see Rishi Sunak, the current Prime Minister of the UK in a primary school uniform. I still enjoyed the freedom of mocking political leaders and public figures.
Before I came to the UK, I had no ideas how British and the gay community like ABBA. I knew about their songs from the movie 'Mamma Mia!' only. 'The Way Old Friends Do' taught me a lot regarding this culture, and motivated me to learn more about ABBA, which went popular since winning Eurovision many years ago. It also guides me to be aware of Eurovision 2023 in Liverpool, not only because the UK is hosting it for Ukraine.
It's quite difficult to understand all in these performances. Maybe I could not understand all of it no matter how many years I stay in the UK. Anyway, it is good to be parts of the show as one of the audience, to feel the vibe and enjoy the freedom.
