A Rebel Rant with Janet Street-Porter

Writing On the Wall Festival
Liverpool Playhouse Theatre
3rd May 2013

Reviewed by Diane Jansen

The stage was set with just a table, two chairs, a bottle of wine and a podium, which would not look out of place in a party political broadcast or a church.

A man appeared on stage who did not introduce himself and said a little bit about her life. Janet then walked on dressed in tight red jeans, multi coloured top, trainers and her well known red hair.

At the beginning of her talk she used quite a lot of F words but stopped doing so when she seemed to relax. She grew up in half a terraced house in Fulham, as tenants lived in the top half and, as the bathroom was upstairs. they had to book a certain time for baths.

Her political life consisted of joining the young Conservatives because they gave good prizes, the Socialists because of the cheese and wine and aged 18 the Anti-Apartheid movement as she was keen on demonstrating.

Janet’s views on young people was that they are now materialistic, which all stems back to education and too much free expression. There is too much emphasis on university is as some degrees are worthless. She also said a lot on universities having a high proportion of foreign students.

Furthermore she commented that the government is packed with old Etonians and women in parliament are pitifully small. Also the selling of utilities was madness.

Then the man with no name came on and asked for questions from the audience for Janet.

Q: What do you think of the Monarchy?
A: I loath the Monarchy they are just there to attract tourists, the palace could be turned into a hotel or a theme park called Windsor World.

Q: Would you go into politics?
A: No, I like control and order, if I was in politics I would be a dictator. Some of the peers make me puke and I hate the honours system.

Q: What do you think of the Big Society?
A: There is a loss of community and a rise of people living alone with people moving away. The Big Society comes from families and pensioners working together.

Q: What about the north and south divide?
A: I have a house in Yorkshire and London so for me there is no north and south divide. Also with Tesco’s a lot of the towns look the same.

The talk and questions lasted about an hour and a half and she got a good response from the audience. Before I heard Janet speak I guess my views were of a very loud, opinionated woman. After her talk I was amazed that I could relate to a lot of what she said. I found her very pleasant, clever and have had to fight to get on in a man’s world. As they say don’t judge a book by its cover!!!

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Comment left by dianejansen on 15th May, 2013 at 16:49
date should be 2013 typing error