Blackpool, Birthdays and a Rather Wild Night at Funny Girls

Friday 23 October 2026

How long does it take to drive from Marlborough to Blackpool? Google Maps suggested something entirely reasonable. The British motorway network, faced with half-term, driving rain and a stiff wind, had other ideas.

We left just after eleven in the morning, full of optimism, with Bandit loaded and the dogs settled on the back seat. They were delighted to be travelling with us and quickly adopted the only sensible response to the traffic: they went to sleep.

Dana and I, unfortunately, had to remain conscious.

The rain rattled against the windscreen. The wind shoved at Bandit’s sides. The traffic crept north at a pace that made walking seem a viable alternative, provided we were prepared to carry the luggage and three dogs.

“How much longer?” Dana asked.

“Not too bad,” I replied, glancing at Google Maps.

She looked at the arrival time.

“You said that two hours ago.”

I was beginning to suspect the satnav was less a navigation tool and more a device for delivering false hope in fifteen-minute instalments.

Luke and Ellen were travelling separately, around half an hour ahead of us, which meant they got to enjoy each traffic jam before we did. I rang Luke to see how they were getting on. No answer.

Half an hour later he called back.

“Sorry, mate. I was sleeping.”

Sleeping! While I was conducting an epic struggle against the nation’s motorway system, Luke was getting his beauty sleep in preparation for a night out. I couldn’t really argue with the logic.

We messaged the hotel to warn them we’d be late. They replied that it was wild in Blackpool.

Perfect, I thought. A wild weekend.

Then another gust of wind hit Bandit and I realised they probably meant the weather.

A birthday and a Blackpool welcome

At half past six, seven and a half hours after setting off, we finally arrived. Blackpool greeted us with rain blowing across the streets, puddles glittering beneath the lights and a wind that seemed personally offended by anyone attempting to remain dry.

It wasn’t quite the Mediterranean. But it was Blackpool, and Ellen had a birthday to celebrate.

There wasn’t time for much lingering at the hotel. We had an evening planned at Funny Girls, the sort of place where a quiet drink can quickly turn into a full theatrical event, and where sitting near the front requires a certain amount of courage.

A short taxi ride carried us through the wet, blustery streets. Outside, the weather was doing its best to put on a performance of its own.

“They weren’t joking about it being wild,” I remarked.

Dana glanced at the rain.

“I think this is what they meant.”

Inside Funny Girls, the contrast couldn’t have been greater. Red and purple light washed over the ornate Art Deco interior. Curved balconies overlooked the room, music filled the air and the stage promised a world of feathers, sequins, towering hairstyles and extraordinary heels.

After hours of brake lights, it felt like we’d arrived in another country. A much more entertaining one.

Ellen tries to disappear

Carmen, the compère, was on magnificent form. In a dramatic black-and-white outfit, with a blonde hairstyle that appeared to have its own structural engineer, she worked the audience with the confidence of someone who had never once been short of a comeback.

Every time she turned towards the crowd, another unsuspecting guest became part of the entertainment.

Ellen, understandably, became very interested in not being one of them.

There is a particular expression people wear when they’re sitting near the front of a comedy show and the performer begins scanning the audience. It’s a mixture of polite enthusiasm and the desperate wish to become invisible.

Ellen had perfected it.

She smiled, laughed and occasionally studied a point somewhere safely away from Carmen’s gaze.

Luke, meanwhile, was behaving suspiciously.

At one point he slipped off to the toilet. Nothing unusual there, except that he used the opportunity to write a note for Carmen.

A note!

For the very person Ellen was trying so hard not to attract attention from.

It turned out Luke had told Carmen it was Ellen’s birthday and requested a song: It’s Raining Men.

Given the weather outside, it was an inspired choice. Blackpool had spent the entire day trying to demonstrate the concept, although fortunately what was falling from the sky was still just water.

Then Carmen announced Ellen’s name.

Ellen’s face was a picture. She had spent the evening doing everything possible to avoid becoming part of the show, and now the compère had announced her birthday to the room. I glanced at Dana, who was grinning. Luke, meanwhile, looked rather pleased with his handiwork.

And then the music started.

It’s Raining Men.

Whatever embarrassment Ellen had felt vanished almost immediately. She and Luke jumped to their feet and started dancing, singing along and throwing themselves into the moment as though they’d been waiting all evening for precisely this invitation.

There was something wonderfully fitting about it. Outside, the rain was being blown sideways along Blackpool’s promenade. Inside, two of our favourite people were dancing to a song about an altogether more entertaining sort of downpour.

Luke’s secret note had worked rather better than any of us expected.

Halloween in heels

The show itself was a riot of Halloween theatricality. Under shifting purple, red and yellow lights, performers swept across the stage in extraordinary costumes, dancing with the sort of balance and confidence I can barely manage while putting on socks.

One performer wore a striking black-and-white harlequin outfit with patterned stockings, a blonde wig and heels that looked more suitable for architectural surveying than dancing. Another appeared in a red-and-black striped jumper and dark hat, adding a wonderfully mischievous Halloween touch.

The music thumped. The audience cheered. Hair flew, costumes sparkled and every number seemed determined to outdo the one before it.

I couldn’t help admiring the effort involved. The performers made it all look easy, which is the surest sign that it wasn’t.

We took photographs whenever we could. In the coloured lights, everyone acquired a slightly otherworldly complexion. Depending on the photograph, we looked either wonderfully glamorous or as though we’d been left too close to a faulty ultraviolet lamp.

But there were lovely moments among all the spectacle. Luke and Ellen sitting close together, their hands clasped as they watched the stage. The four of us leaning into a photograph, grinning like people who had finally escaped the motorway. Dana enjoying the entertainment, Ellen relaxing into her birthday evening and Luke looking entirely too pleased with himself.

That’s what I remember most clearly now. Not the traffic or the rain, but the four of us together, laughing at the same ridiculous moments.

A weekend away with friends doesn’t need perfect weather, or even a sensible journey. It needs the sort of company that can turn a seven-and-a-half-hour drive into a story you’ll be telling for years.

The weekend was only beginning

By the end of the evening, the miserable journey seemed a long way behind us. Blackpool was still being battered by the weather outside, but inside Funny Girls there was laughter, music, warmth and more glitter than any reasonable building should be expected to contain.

Ellen’s birthday weekend had begun exactly as a Blackpool weekend ought to: loudly, unpredictably and in excellent company.

We’d come for a wild weekend. Blackpool had supplied wild weather, wild entertainment and a birthday dedication delivered with impeccable comic timing.

And thanks to Luke, we’d discovered that the best response to a Blackpool downpour was not necessarily to find an umbrella.

Sometimes, you just have to get up and dance.