Culture The Coast Is Queer returns to Brighton with Juno Dawson, Damian Barr and Yael Van Der Wouden The UK’s biggest festival of LGBTQ+ literature - The Coast Is Queer - returns to Brighton’s Attenborough Centre from 9 - 12 October. Headline writers include Yael Van Der Wouden, Juno Dawson, Munroe Bergdorf, Ali Smith, Jackie Kay, Travis Alabanza, Damian Barr and Joelle Taylor. Panel sessions will By Brian Butler • 2 min read
Culture Review: The Lightning Thief What began as a bedtime story for his son by Rick Riordan, the Percy Jackson sequence of fantasy novels sold 180 million copies and so it was inevitable it would become a stage musical. Writers Joe Tracz (book) and Rob Rokicki (music and lyrics), clearly owe a debt of gratitude By Brian Butler • 2 min read
Culture Review: The Code “This entire town is a cesspool, darling. Beautifully lit, well-appointed, but a cesspool nonetheless.” Those opening lines directed straight at the audience by stage and screen icon Tallulah Bankhead set the scene for Michael McKeever’s dark, witty, searingly honest expose of the hypocrisy of golden age Hollywood. As the By Brian Butler • 3 min read
Culture REVIEW: "Sexy and dangerous" 'Born With Teeth' has bite! It’s London, 1591. In an upstairs room over an inn rising star playwright William Shakespeare (Edward Bluemel), has enlisted the help of fading playwright Christopher Marlowe (Ncuti Gatwa) to write a sure-fire blockbuster play about Henry VI - or maybe three plays if it all goes well. They are By Brian Butler • 3 min read
queer fringe Fringe! -queer film and arts fest celebrates 15 Fringe! -queer film and arts fest celebrates 15 years - offering a loud story of joy, solidarity and radical imagination. Here are just a few items that caught my eye. By Brian Butler • 2 min read
Edward Bluemel as William Shakespeare Culture Was Shakespeare queer ? William Shakespeare’s sexuality, the homoerotic relationship between a talk show host and a composer, and the closeted world of Hollywood’s gay actors all feature on the London stage this month and next. Scholars and LGBTQ+ commentators are undecided about whether our greatest playwright William Shakespeare was gay or By Brian Butler • 2 min read
Sandi Goodwin Sandi Goodwin: The art of making art Queer musical theatre genius Stephen Sondheim said: “the art of making art is putting it together, bit by bit.” And Sandi Goodwin has certainly done that, in a varied life which has encompassed being an aspiring dancer and actor, then HIV nurse and activist, theatre producer, and now an abstract By Brian Butler • 5 min read
Culture Actually Fabulous - 20th anniversary concert from Actually Gay Men's Chorus For their 20th anniversary concert, Actually Gay Men’s Chorus in Brighton chose Actually Fabulous as the title of the show. No modesty and none needed. It’s an ever-surprising choral group under the meticulous and energetic musical direction of Samuel Cousins and with Simon Gray’s immaculate accompaniment, and By Brian Butler • 3 min read
Community Corner This year's official Brighton & Hove Pride dance video to support the trans community Five trans drag artists will headline in this year’s official Brighton & Hove Pride dance video. The brainchild of 201 Dance Company’s Brighton-based artistic director Andrea Walker, the video, which last year had one million social media hits, will strongly support the trans community. And Brighton queers and By Brian Butler • 3 min read
Features & Longread 7/7 - 20 years on: a personal memory On 7 July 2005 I was not in my office at the British Medical Association’s HQ in Tavistock Square, London. Instead, as Director of Communications I was attending a meeting at the British Medical Journal’s offices in the same building but further up Upper Woburn Place towards Euston. By Brian Butler • 4 min read
Community Corner “What they do to one of us, they do to all of us” - Rainbow Chorus Summer concert On the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, Brighton’s Rainbow Chorus gave an emotional, defiant and joyful concert under the title Anthems In Colour. And they had a battle of their own with technical issues. No stage lighting because it had been stolen and a last-minute sound system didn’t By Brian Butler • 2 min read
Culture Review: This Bitter Earth at Soho Theatre First things first: if you are in London June/July to use playwright Harrison David Rivers’ language, you need to get your cute butt down to the Soho Theatre and see This Bitter Earth. Actually, if you are anywhere in the UK or abroad and visiting London, then you need By Brian Butler • 2 min read
