Starting as I mean to go on in 2026, I’ve devised a set of cultural new year’s resolutions – not for me but for the live-entertainment industry, of which I have been crowned queen.
My ascent to this throne is good news for my previously underwhelming CV, but it’s great news for anyone who has ever languished in a state of baffled frustration, making a wild stab at known unknowns as they try to guess the shape of their night. I speak, of course, of the most enduring mystery of the universe since the dawn of existence: stage times.
Under my progressive reign, it will soon become law for all artists, promoters and venues – all of them – to advertise stage times for gigs 48 hours in advance. Only performers traumatised by ferry crossings will be permitted to deviate from them.
I once read an interview with someone richer than me who believed that if you’ve never missed a flight you’re spending too long in airports. A version of that rule should apply to gig venues: if you’ve never legged it in the door while an artist is halfway through their first song, you’re spending too long staring at roadies in the dark.
Yes, the support act will be forever grateful for your apparent abundance of time. Yes, the band will appreciate your rash decision to shell out for a branded tote bag while everyone waited for the guitarist to locate his shoes. But we don’t have to live like this. We deserve to know.
In March 2025 I bought a ticket for Tragedy Plus Time, Ed Byrne’s profoundly funny stand-up show about the death of his younger brother, Paul, from liver failure and Covid complications. The only information I could glean in advance from the recesses of the internet was an early-seeming “doors open” time. The numbers who wandered in shamefaced, mid-tragedy, suggested I wasn’t alone in my confusion.
They weren’t so much late as they were “late”, as Byrne acknowledged, telling them not to worry – they weren’t interrupting a sensitive story or anything. “Who knows when this show really starts? NOT TICKETMASTER.”
I’ve got other resolutions, but that’s the main one. Fix it and I’ll even let Ticketmaster carry on sending its “how did we do?” emails the morning after. So needy. So cute. Hey, Ticketmaster, your QR code was the best QR code I’ve ever had. No, I’m okay for earplugs.
What I would like, however, is a more enlightened approach to intervals. Specifically, I would like more theatre producers to question the orthodoxy of having them.
Lately there’s been a delightful trend in London to stage productions so concise that they don’t require an interval. Six, the breezy musical in which the wives of Henry VIII are reinvented as pop princesses, is one such joy. It’s over before you can say “Anne of Cleves is hilarious”, and it doesn’t suffer for it.
The intense one-person play Prima Facie, which Jodie Comer comes to the Gaiety in Dublin with later this month, is another example, as is 2025’s compelling Inter Alia, by the same playwright, Suzie Miller. David Ireland’s entertaining The Fifth Step, which ran in the West End last summer, is also in the interval-free club, though when I saw it a technical fault gave us time for both leg-stretching and brief paranoia about whether the play would restart.
This anti-interval movement is a brilliant development for those of us who prefer to talk to friends somewhere other than cramped theatre bars that reek of cough sweets and disappointing wine.
Counterintuitively, it’s also a positive thing for those of us with weak bladders and/or fears about our weak bladders. I can proudly say I’ve won every colour of medal in the Aisle Seat to Ladies’ Room Interval Sprint. Despite this success, I still have exhausting toilet panic before a play starts, and an interval doesn’t help: it merely prompts an anxiety encore.
There are other trends I’d like to encourage from my perch as monarch. Gigs where artists play the entirety of an album, then maybe throw in some other songs if we’re nice to them, are to be welcomed. Everyone knows where they stand when they commit to going, whether the album is new – Lily Allen, for instance, will perform West End Girl straight through on her upcoming tour – or the subject of an anniversary revisit.
Speaking of anniversaries, those are also allowed. “It’s been on the 50th-anniversary tour for the last five years,” Jason Donovan joked as he promoted The Rocky Horror Show recently on Channel 4. The lesson here is simple: give the people what they want, and don’t stress about the maths.
Stress instead about the penalties for noncompliance with my imminent Stage Times Transparency Act – because things are about to change around here. Look, there’s the drummer. Elbows down, conversations over. The show has begun.