I Have Found

It seems to me that London has matinees not just Wednesdays, Saturdays, and sometimes Sundays... but everyday. So we let ourselves sleep in this morning, and took off to TKTS just after noon. Snagged tickets for the matinee of Carousel and the evening show of Les Miserables.

The TKTS booth is located in Leicester Square, which I've mysteriously been pronouncing incorrectly my entire life. You've been pronouncing it Ly-chester as well, yes? YOU'RE WRONG. It's Lester. Yeah. Forget everything you learned about reading. Leicester = Lester.

Anyway.

The Donmar. :-D This theater is currently showing Hamlet starring a little known man named Jude Law. I'm sure you'll be shocked to hear that its completely sold out and impossible to get tickets to.

London TKTS booth! Which gave us AMAZING seats. London TKTS FTW.

The faces of Mike during lunch in Leicester Square.

The Savoy Theatre, where Carousel is playing, managed to escape my visit with no photographic evidence that it really exists or that I was even there. Mostly because the entire theater is covered in scaffolding at the moment, and there was literally nothing I could have taken a picture of on the outside, and wasn't allowed to take pictures on the inside. So... c'est la vie.

But I can give this:

A pictures of the two stars of Carousel. Not taken by me... obviously. But found on Google!

I was overjoyed to find out that Carousel was playing out here. I've never seen a production of it, but I have some of my fondest memories after being in the show last fall. TKTS gave us seats in the SECOND ROW - for around 36 pounds. Yeah. Suck it, NYC. ;-)

The show was beautiful. The cast was great. It made me teary and sappy and "You'll Never Walk Alone" was a sobfest. The end.

After the show, which ran just under 3 hours, we made our way out to Picadilly Circus. And no, not a circus with elephants. Unfortunately. Just a location. Sort of the "Times Square" of London, I'd say.

Pictures of the Picadilly Circus area:

And London's Chinatown:

We grabbed dinner at a really cute Italian place down the street from the Queens Theatre, where Les Mis plays.

A desert called The Godfather. Lots of ice cream and brownie and whipped cream and general yummyness.

And then we saw Les Mis. Our TKTS seats were in the Dress Circle (their mezzanine), third row. Great seat. The show was fantastic - the entire cast was insanely talented, especially their Jean Valjean. Out of this world good.

Observations about theater in London:

1. You'll notice that in my short blurbs on these shows, I have not singled out any actors. This is because their version of a Playbill is not given to you upon entrance. It is sold. And being cheap, I did not purchase.

2. London theatergoers are FAR more picky about giving standing ovations. American audiences leap to their feets almost instantly. London audiences seem a bit more difficult to please. Which I appreciate.

3. FOOD. Before Carousel began, they were selling pringles, trail mix, bottles of water and tiny bottles of wine in the aisles. But here is the BEST PART - at intermission, they sell ICE CREAM. Yes, ice cream. Little containers of ice cream with little spoons. Seriously, you guys, London theater for. the. win.

I'm sure I'll notice more things when we see more shows. We definitely plan to see We Will Rock You, and we already have tickets to see Waiting for Godot starring Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen. No, I'm not lying.

Tomorrow's plan is sketchy at best, but we WILL be setting an alarm for 7am to hopefully catch the hotel's breakfast. So now is the time to sleep, since it is soon to be midnight.

'Nite!

*K