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Are US Tourists Getting a Bum Deal???

Date: 11 February 2003

Are American "butts" getting bigger or are London theatre seats too small? Apparently, it's a bit of both. The five million US tourists who visit every year are finding the West End theatre a tight squeeze, according to Labour MP Chris Bryant. He has told the House of Commons that Victorian-sized theatre seats are deterring American bums. "The seats were built for backsides of a Victorian era, not of a modern era, or indeed an American size," he says. He goes on, in the vein of Cameron Mackintosh's refurbishment bugbear, that "many of the bars are dingy and overpriced and haven't seen a lick of paint since Oscar Wilde was last there". According to Bryant, unless the 37 Edwardian and Victorian theatres in London get a face-lift and bottom job the �1 billion that American tourists bring to the West End ever year could be lost.

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