For the past year and a half Crystal Palace has been embroiled in a battle to save our last remaining public entertainment venue from the hands of a wealthy evangelical 'mega church', which has a somewhat questionable history and holds some strong views. This is despite ongoing interest from an independent cinema chain, whose potential presence in Crystal Palace would do wonders for its regeneration and would offer an inclusive resource for the whole community. Consequently the Picture Palace Campaign was born and on Saturday night we attended a campaign dinner with a Victorian theme at, irony of ironies, the St John the Evangelist church down the road.
The Sphinx Dining Club certainly put on a good show and I am kind of embarrassed that I didn't dress up to embrace the theme, seeing that most of the 120 guests had. Those that know me know that this is highly out of character, but we had Beth's mother staying and I didn't really think she'd be too comfortable dressing up in a feather boa, bloomers and a basque. I guess I could have looked to Tipping the Velvet for some inspiration, but seeing as I am not exactly mammarily challenged, rent-boy drag would have required some serious suspension of disbelief. Plus I don't think a leather strap-on would have gone down well with the masses and certainly not in church!
Anyway, there was good food, good wine and some 'interesting' entertainment. Plus some ribald conversation on our table about long fingers and pork pies. I'll leave it to your imagination to guess what we were talking about. The venue looked a treat, like some decadent music hall. I half expected Marie Lloyd to pop up and start The Boy I Love in Up in the Gallery. But, the night got messier by the hour. I blame the Hendrick's gin cocktails pre-dinner, the copious amounts of red wine during dinner and the subsequent bourbon and cokes at the after show party at Los Toreros. Crystal Palace's only tapas bar must have resembled some gin-soaked Victorian boozer, with women in feathers, corsets and basques, men with handle-bar moustaches and top hats and plenty of carousing.
The locals came out in force, including our cats' vet. Do you think that with vets you need to maintain that line of professional distance as you do with doctors? I mean it's not like they're examining you. However, I bet the practitioners at our local vets have probably diagnosed me with 'mad cat woman syndrome', such is my irrational devotion to my pussies. I remember I saw my therapist once in Marks and Spencer's and instinctively knew that I shouldn't go up and start engaging her in conversation about some cardigan Twiggy wore on an M&S advert. But, I hadn't just consumed three Hendricks's gin martinis on that occasion and so if there was a professional line to be crossed on Saturday night, then I'm sure I crossed it!
Hopefully there will be more events with more themes. I beg them to hold a Studio 54 night. Now that's a theme I WILL embrace!
