Brilliant new club nights and shows for 2012!

RVT Xmas Blizzard, December 2009.

What an incredible December 2009 at the RVT, a month so packed with exciting and varied performance we are surprised the boards of the stage haven’t worn out!

The RVT was in her glittering Christmas best with even more surprises hidden in the rafters. Snow machines were loaded, the smoke machine was full and she was ready to hitch up those skirts and party with the kids straight into the New Year. (DOB 1863, but still kicking!)
Timberlina’s Bingo Pub night occupied the Monday slot throughout most of December. With her sack full of carefully chosen prizes, the very best that the Peckham pound shops had to offer, Timberlina regaled the crowds with her hilarious wit and drunken wisdom while DJ Hey Baylen spun a Christmas smorgasbord of hits.

After only six months, Bar Wotever is now a Tuesday night institution, always bursting with exciting new talent onstage and off. The hi-jinx continued at the first annual Bar Wotever Slumber Party on Christmas Eve!

The first cold snap of winter coincided with the City Limits theatre company’s production of ‘Dogging’ in the park just behind the RVT. Renowned as an establishment of fortitude and morality, the RVT offered support to the distressed in the form of warmth, (very much needed) mulled wine and jacket potatoes. This theatrical display of British Spirit showed exactly what activities can take place at 0”C with a wind chill factor of minus 40 in a Vauxhall park!

Back inside with the thermostat settled at 21”C, as Bourgeois & Maurice, Jonny Woo and Scottee launched ‘A FESTIVE HAPPENING.’ Ann incredible three nights of the very best the Alternative Cabaret circuit has to offer. Jonny Woo’s hilarious Spam Ayers and Scottee’s Lady in Red were cutting edge and fantastic to behold. Bourgeois & Maurice complemented this fantastic run of evenings from the main stage. A riotous party continued into the early hours of Saturday.
Duckie and S.L.A.G.S Chillout powered up to maximum throttle for the Christmas and New Years season. (A little more on this later.)

"A group of women escape from the Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens and go into a dark wood - they stray from the path (‘Oh no!’), they get lost (‘Oh dear!’) and all manner of things happen to them as they meet a wild bunch of vixens along the way (Oh great!)". ‘Vixens in the Woods’ was the first women’s panto at the RVT and was a resounding success with weekday evening and Saturday matinee performances. Definitely beats shopping!

Next up: Dave’s drop in Centre– YULE SPECIAL -- with the one and only David Hoyle directed by Nathan Evans. The show provided shelter for debtors, dropouts, deviants, drunks, the disturbed, the disempowered & the discerning. We maybe a little bias here at the RVT but we did feel the discerning were in the majority. For those that missed this Night David Hoyle returns to the stage of the RVT for the first five Thursdays of 2010.

As December 2009 continued, the MAC cosmetics Christmas party produced enough performances for the entire RVT Christmas season! The makeup was fantastic, the girls also looked great. The Christmas spirits were flowing. I was starting to lag now, liver complaining of too many lime juices and sodas but onward to Christmas and New Year.

On Friday 18th the RVT hosted triple helpings with:
-- Alp Haydar’s Christmas Alparet! A rabble-rousing and up-beat performance accompanied by Richard Link on piano and,
-- ‘the hardest-working cabaret personality in show business’, David Mills' Vegas-spectacular, Christmas Inferno! It was a Crimbo song-fest full of showbiz gossip, rousing numbers and special guests Mizz Kimberley, Suzi Ruffle, Fred Bear and that naked elf, Ernesto Sarezale! (Mary J. Blige with the Vienna Boys Choir couldn’t make it.)
-- The night came to a messy conclusion with BOOGALOO STU and his cast of showbiz hangers-on and their nightclub-discotheque-cum-celebration-of-the-pie-fight-as-art-form, Splosh-o-Rama!

The RVT’s Annual Christmas panto took centre stage for five performances at the end of December including the customary slot between Christmas and New Year. SCALLYLADIN directed by Nathan Evans and starring FANCY CHANCE, SCOTTEE, DICKIE BEAU, LA JOHN JOSEPH, DAVID HOYLE packed the house with queues out the door. With script in hand, Nathan even had to step in for an ill Scottee on Tuesday 29th! Well done Nathan, the show must go on!

New Year’s Eve… what a party! I’m still recovering! Tickets sold out well in advance. The night started with Simon LeVans and a special show from the D.E.Experience. The crowd was singing along, screaming for more! The D.E.Experience rang in the New Year sharing the stage with a mass of revellers and a special indoor fire work display prepared by Robert. Andy Almighty spun hits to lift the roof off as usual Sean Sirrs followed until an amazing 6am! (Haven’t any of you got homes to go to?? From what I saw not many were heading home even at 6 in the morning!)

Too many parties to comment on here as there were two more S.L.A.G.S Chillouts on the Friday and the Monday and in between – Duckie! -- which was packed to the rafters for their first night of 2010.
We at the RVT hope you had a wonderful 2009, a fantastic Christmas and New Year and we take this opportunity to wish you all the best for 2010.

I would also like to thank all our customers, staff, performers and all those that beaver behind the scenes to make the RVT the vibrant and exciting place that it is.

Get ready for 2010, baby! It’s gonna be a banner year and an amazing decade. The RVT is gonna keep kicking ass as long as there’s music to be played, shows to be shown and fun to be had. We’re gonna be checking-in like this more frequently too so expect to hear from us even more.
There’s more coming -- lots more. Get ready because this old girl hasn’t even got started!

Speak to you again soon

Paul Oxley
RVT