The Prince of Egypt musical trip

Clockwise: The Dominion Theatre; bedroom at the Zedwell Piccadilly hotel; pornstar martini pitcher

### Location

London

***The*** ***Prince of Egypt* musical trip** took place on the 7-8 March 2020and involved Barbra McCauliffe and Edgar Spears travelling to London to see *The Prince of Egypt* in the West End.

It started off with a train journey that almost gave them COVID-19, and then ended with cocktails at London's gay district.

## Pre-musical journey

### **Train to London**

As is usual, Spears was collected by McCauliffe and her dad to get to the train station. McCauliffe had recommended they get the 15:51 LNER service, and Spears agreed. However, he hadn't bought his ticket yet. As they were by the Queensgate roundabout, McCauliffe suddenly wasn't as sure that they would make this train, despite deriding her father for speeding. When they eventually reached the station, the barriers were fortunately open so they raced to get to the train. They got on board as Spears was on his phone trying to purchase a ticket. However, the app wouldn't allow him to. This caused some minor concern from the pair, and a nosy mother with her child commented on their predicament by saying 'let's hope the ticket check doesn't happen, or perhaps you'll have to just keep going to the toilet'.

Originally settling on sitting in the corridor, they decided to sit down on the seats. McCauliffe was greeted by a damp, coffee-stained napkin and the top of a lid. They then had to sit and endure a man sat behind them who was coughing and spluttering regularly. Naturally, the pair suspected coronavirus, and they were instantly convinced that they were going to be dying any minute. There was a moment where the train came to a stop, and a police officer patrolled the carriages.

They arrived into King's Cross without too much actually going wrong. However, Spears was concerned that the barriers might not be open, and he didn't have a ticket. Fortunately they were open, so they didn't need to initiate McCauliffe's plan of putting the ticket in and then quickly racing in after her. Spears got an entire train journey to London for free.

### **Locating the hotel**

After barely making it with their lives from the train, they made their way to the Tube where they made a considered effort not to touch too many surfaces. However, any minor jolt and they ended up with their palms coiled around some kind of pole or handle, so their efforts were all for nothing.

They got off at Leicester Square, where they searched for the Zedwell Piccadilly hotel. As they exited the Tube station they were met by a busy thoroughfare, where McCauliffe tried to calibrate her Google Maps to find the hotel. When they'd got their bearings, they set off to cross the road. Their attention was drawn to an extremely old woman - hunched, frail, wrinkled - who looked as if she was struggling to balance even with the aid of her walking stick. Despite her feeble frame, she was itching to march into the road even though cars, taxis and buses were racing by. Members of the public appeared to be deeply concerned about her, especially about the fact she kept stepping into the unsafe road multiple times.

As the pair reached Leicester Square, they saw a brawl taking place outside the Hippodrome. A drunken dad was being pinioned by security guards, while his son tried to placate him. Naturally, a crowd had gathered to watch instead of help. In the crowd was the old lady, standing precariously and dangerously close to the action, to the point that another member of public had to again protect her. As the fight simmered down, a woman involved in the scuffle cried to the crowd 'what are you all staring at!?'.

### **The hotel**

They found it after a few minutes, and were met with a check in system that didn't involve a human being. After the tedium of finalising their details and authorising their stay, the fun really began to kick off. As they got to their floor out of the lift, they saw an endless number of corridors that all looked identical: grey, dark and modern.

They looked for signs that would direct them to their room: 3319(?). However, this quickly proved easier said than done. The pair, convinced they were on the right track, would confidently make their way down a certain corridor only for them to discover a dead end. The winding, snake-like corridors then took them to a section of the hotel that, only as the pair went in, indicated it wasn't safe for the public and was under construction. The floor was covered with film, rooms were still being built and there was random hard hats littering different aisles.

They eventually managed to find their room, and were frustrated to find it was a double bed as McCauliffe had specifically requested a twin bed room. The room was unlike any hotel room the pair had seen before. The bed was on a raised wooden platform, with just a patch of space for moving. The toilet was essentially a box with a door that didn't have a lock made of frosted glass. The same was the case for the shower, while the sink was basically in the room. There was no TV, chair, table or windows.

McCauliffe said she wasn't going to stand for it, and the pair left the room and had to navigate their way back to the lifts. They reached reception and spoke to a woman who, when the situation was explained to her, told them how booking.com (the website they booked the room through) couldn't guarantee any specific type of room. However, she did change their room for them to a triple room that included one double bed and one single bed.

This time on the 5th floor, they once again struggled to find their fucking room. They were checking signs that pointed in one direction, but then when they checked the signs the arrows had changed directions. Finally, they found their second room and sat on the ends of their beds. The room was so unusual it really unsettled Spears and McCauliffe, so they spent a few minutes sat on the ends of their beds unsure about what to do.

After getting ready to leave, they once again took on the corridors. McCauliffe walked past a door that had a sign on the handle, which she flipped over for bants. They made their way out of the hotel and the lady who helped them earlier wished them a good evening. However, a few seconds out of the hotel Spears realised he'd forgotten his glasses, so the pair had to go back to the room and get them. As they were departing for the second time, McCauliffe revisited the door she had ruthlessly flipped the sign on and put it on another door instead.

## Musical

### **Seeing *The Prince of Egypt***

They made it to the Dominion Theatre, where they decided to get drinks. They bought two double Barcadis and Coke, and then two others for the interval. Spears also bought some M&Ms.

As they sat in their damn good seats, they tried to take pictures of the stage. However, a balding man decided he would take as long as it took Moses to cross the Red Sea to sit down in his seat. He stood there for ages, disrobing until he was just in a red polo shirt and jeans, and then after taking all his layers very slowly descending into his seat. There was also an East Asian woman who was with an extremely elderly old man, the two however were impressed with the folding phone the woman had.

The pair then waited in anticipation for the epic opening number - "Deliver Us" - and then watched the performance. At the interval, they went to locate their drinks. McCauliffe waited in a queue, but Spears suspected that the drinks would be left out on the side somewhere with their names on. After running up and down the whole damn foyer, he eventually found them at the closest place to McCauliffe.

As the play came to a close, McCauliffe and Spears reflected on how, although they admired the ambition of the musical, it was ultimately inferior to its film counterpart. They loved Nefertari, but they weren't particularly taken with the new songs.

## Gays

### **The pornstar pitcher**

After the pair left the musical, they were longing for a cocktail. Spears told McCauliffe he knew a gay bar (of course) that did cocktails, so they made their way to Village. They weren't letting people in because it was a private party, which was a shame because a hot naked guy was dancing in the window. They found another gay bar called the Rupert Street Bar that did cocktails, and the staff were topless and *fit*.

They read the menu and settled on getting a pornstar martini pitcher. The image they had in their head was a jug and two glasses. They were very wrong, as they were presented with an enormous martini glass filled to the absolute brim with pornstar martini.

As they both very carefully transported the huge chalice of alcoholic sugar through the bar, they received many comments, mostly of a 'wow that's huge' nature. They then placed the martini on a table by the window and began the task of finishing a drink concocted for the 5,000.

Adjacent to their table was a young gay and a woman who had interacted with McCauliffe and Spears earlier on. The young gay came over and asked Spears where he knew actor and comedian David Mitchell from. Spears said from the show *Peep Show*, so the young gay told Spears that he had just met David Mitchell outside the theatre next to the bar and had taken a picture of him unaware of who he actually was. McCauliffe and Spears looked at each other, wondering why he went to the effort of telling us such a pointless story.

### **Pump and Village**

They left Rupert Street Bar and then returned to see if Village was letting anyone in. However, McCauliffe was eager to be reunited with her one true love: the Pump. After finding it and taking some pictures with her bae, they made their way to Village. Spears had a few drinks, but McCauliffe had been left in critical condition by the pornstar pitcher so eschewed any alcoholic drinks.

They met a group of older gays who were desperate to know the pair's names. They then believed McCauliffe actually worked for NASA, purely because her bomber jacket had a NASA badge. One of the older gays kept pestering Spears about why he was so 'boring'.

As they made their way back to the hotel (McCauliffe stopping in a convenience store to get some Shortbread and a pretty basic cheese and onion sandwich), Spears saw actress Samantha Janus (known for her role as Ronnie Mitchell in *EastEnders*) just standing by the road.

They actually managed to find their room pretty well, and after getting ready for bed started reminiscing about a fart compilation video they used to watch on YouTube that currently has 2.4 million views. They spent the rest of the evening laughing at it before going to sleep. McCauliffe was slightly concerned when she couldn't find the video on YouTube straight away, but it was discovered later the following day that she had actually typed 'fart c*ompetition'* into YouTube instead.

## Next day

### **Morgan**

Whilst on the train home, the two could not find a seat and decided to sit between the carriages. They had a fairly standard journey back, with only a few people passing through between them. That was until a man wearing a maroon jumper and cream slacks decided to move his phone call from the carriage to the gangway. It was later discovered that the man's name was Morgan, though it is unclear if that was his first or last name.

Though it was not clear what the reason of Morgan's phonecall was, he often had to spell words out using the Military Phonetical Alphabet - McCauliffe managed to jot down the end of a Postcode or a Password *H5W6.*