7pm Monday 16 July at the Groucho Club, Dean Street
Social media - especially Instagram - brims with them, but what makes an influencer? What influence can they actually have? Is it fair that domestic abusers chucked out of TOWIE can still make a living from their social media presence? Is it right that teenagers can amass thousands of followers? How does this new class of celebrity work - does taking photos holding up sachets of tummy teas even count as work? And how do we the public lap it all up?
To discuss, Trouble is hosting Holly Bourne, the author of best-selling novel How Do You Like Me Now, journalist Vicky Spratt, art director and trend researcher Natalie Hasseck and Sirin Kale, Broadly associate editor who recently explored an influencer-only app INTO, offering influencers free dinners in exchange for social media clout.
£10 for members of Trouble (you may also book a ticket for a friend @£10)
£20 for non-members of Trouble
Please note, you have to be a paid-up member of Trouble for the reduced price tickets.
Wednesday 11th July
7.30pm - 9pm - L’Escargot, Soho
The Customs Union, Northern Ireland’s frontier, Parliament in revolt, requests to do deals with pussy-grabber-in-chief Donald Trump, threats of chlorinated chicken and talk of launching our own £3 billion satellites? Welcome to the Great British Brexit.
Remainers hope the arguments for staying, or at least not slamming the door on our closest trade partners and allies, might be heard all over again. Could we have a People’s Vote? What do you do if you want to remain, or get as close to it, with a sensible Brexit?
How do you make a difference?
Shaking up the usual format, we’re going to find out members’ point of view on different themes, then we’ll ask Anna Soubry and others TBC to explain how you’ll best use your energies to be part of The Women’s (Hard) Brexit Resistance Front.
£12 for members of Trouble (you may also book a ticket for a friend @£12)
£20 for non-members of Trouble
Please note, you have to be a paid-up member of Trouble for the reduced price tickets.
Wednesday 13th June
2.30pm - 4pm - The Victoria & Albert Museum, South Kensington
Trouble has landed some very exclusive tickets to a private preview of Making Her Self Up, the new Frida Kahlo exhibition at the V&A. Tickets are free for members so if you’d like to get your hands on them, please visit our Facebook page right away.
This event will feature an early preview of the exhibition, which explores the way Kahlo combined her art with Mexican iconography to create her now-iconic and striking personal identity. There will also be a special talk from the curator, Circe Henestrosa, so do join us for this opportunity to see Kahlo’s artefacts shown for the first time outside of Mexico.
Monday 14 May
7pm - The Groucho Club, Soho
Why America First and what happened to the American Dream? This is the question posed by Professor Sarah Churchwell, in her new book Behold America, and also a question many liberal Americans must ask themselves every morning over coffee in the era of Donald Trump.
Sarah will both look at the roots of the America First movement that started in 1940 and how the US puts itself back together again after its most divisive President. She is Professor of Public Understanding at the University of London and a brilliant speaker. This is a highly recommended evening.
NB This is a members only event. Members may bring three guests.
Friday 27 April
8.45pm, The Soho Theatre
Trouble's Sophie Wilkinson recommends Primates at the Soho Theatre because, she says, its star Tessa Coates is proper funny. Coates is one part of the Massive Dad women's sketch group - their last Edinburgh show sold out. So we called the Soho Theatre and now have a dozen discounted tickets and a booth reserved in the bar to drink in before and after the show. Who's in?
Read more here: https://sohotheatre.com/shows/tessa-coates-primates/
Monday 16 April 2018
7pm - Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH
Make no mis-steak, we’re in the midst of a plant-based revolution. You’re never more than 20 paces from a new vegan joint, serving up mushroom scallops, seitan chicken and kale salads. 150,000 people took part in Veganuary, supermarkets now stock coconut-oil based imitation parmesan, and tofu scramble.
But let's make no bones about it: veganism is controversial. Is it actually healthier than a meat-based diet, is it more ethical when quinoa becomes a cash crop, and should we all switch, who will be the winners and losers in the global economy.
Leading us through the garden of vegan, we’ll be joined by VICE writer and vegan Hannah Ewens, entrepreneur and vegan Emma Sinclair, omnivore food writer and café owner Rosie Lovell and Tomi Makanjuola, who runs the food blog The Vegan Nigerian.
£8 for paying members and £8 for your guest
£20 for non-members
Find out about membership here
Sunday 11 March 2018
12 noon at The Gate Picturehouse, Notting Hill
Ok, not strictly speaking one of our events but... who is up for the cinema trip on Sunday to see the documentary on the actress and inventor Hedy Lamarr?
It is being put on Birds Eye View, the women's film collective, at the Gate Picturehouse. Tickets directly through them, followed by a talk by Harriet Hall. After that we are going for lunch at Polpo across the road in Notting Hill
For tickets to the film, please book directly with -> The Gate <-
If you would like to come for the Trouble lunch, click through on the Bombshell poster which will take you through to reserve a place. No flaking out.
Monday 26th February 2018
PLEASE NOTE THE VENUE CHANGE
7pm at ***Mortimer House***
37–41 Mortimer Street, Fitzrovia, London W1T 3JH
One of two women to reach the UK’s Supreme Court and the first to become president of the highest court in the land, Lady Baroness Brenda Hale has had a varied career as an academic lawyer, law reformer - particularly within the realm of family law - and judge.
Lawyer Miriam Gonzalez Durantez, who has a slightly better working knowledge of the law than our co-founder Joy, will be interviewing Lady Hale, who will detail the role of the courts in 2018, discuss the importance of diversity in all echelons of the legal system, and tell us all about her own career rising up through the ranks of an industry which, when she first arrived at the bar in 1969, saw women make up only 2.7% (750) of all solicitors and an even smaller proportion of all barristers.
£8 for paying members and £8 for your guest
£20 for non-members
Find out about membership here
Monday 12 February 2018
7pm at the Groucho Club
Vishala Sri-Pathma, business presenter and reporter for BBC News 24, started off her long love affair with economics at JP Morgan. Knowing the importance placed on beauty in a high profile role, she will chair a panel on beauty: does being beautiful/attractive make you more successful? Are beautiful women more successful? What price do we pay to be more attractive, and what’s the opportunity cost of not having a beauty regime?
We’ll be joined by journalist and author Daisy Buchanan, former Miss Britain titleholder Amy Willerton and body-language expert Judi James, who'll be able to guide us through the ways image is also down to what you do with it.
£8 for member and bring a guest at that price
£20 for non-members
Monday 5th February
6pm, Entertainment One Films, 45 Warren Street, Fitzrovia, London. W1T 6AG.
Based on the unbelievable but true events, I, TONYA is a darkly comedic tale of American figure skater, Tonya Harding, and one of the most sensational scandals in sports history. Though Harding was the first American woman to complete a triple axel in competition, her legacy was forever defined by her association with an infamous, ill-conceived, and even more poorly executed attack on fellow Olympic competitor Nancy Kerrigan. Featuring an iconic turn by Margot Robbie as the fiery Harding, a mustachioed Sebastian Stan as her impetuous ex-husband Jeff Gillooly, a tour-de-force performance from Allison Janney as her acid-tongued mother, LaVona Golden, and an original screenplay by Steven Rogers, Craig Gillespie’s I, TONYA is an absurd, irreverent, and piercing portrayal of Harding’s life and career in all of its unchecked––and checkered––glory.
FREE but limited availability so email zara@thetroubleclub.com to place your interest for you and a plus one. Trouble members get priority
Monday 8 January 2018
7pm at the Groucho Club
We’ve secured a Brief Encounter with Emma Rice. You will know Emma from her tenure at Shakespeare’s Globe, which wasn't without controversy. That’s coming to an end and we’re catching her as she prepares for her hi-tech revival of the Noël Coward play begins at the Empire Cinema in Haymarket. This is an event not to be missed by any theatrically-inclined Troublista.
£8 for member and bring a guest at that price
£20 for non-members
Monday 11 December 2017
6pm Entertainment One Films, Fitzrovia
As a Christmas treat, Trouble has been offered a free screening of the film Molly’s Game, which isn't released nationwide until New Year's Day. Because it sounds like a full deck of fun, we’ve said yes. It is also an excuse for a little pre-Christmas drinks evening.
The film is based on the memoir of high-stakes gambler Molly Bloom, who saw her world tumble after getting too close to the Mafia, Jessica Chastain plays the lead, one of those rare female characters who “are proactive, have their own point of view and don’t just react to men around them”, as the actress puts it. And if your celluloid desires aren’t so lofty, the gorgeous Idris Elba co-stars.
Once the credits roll, we’ll head over to a local pub for drinks and a debrief, card games optional.
Monday 23 October 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
Emergency meeting! A moment has come: many of us have previously spoken amongst ourselves about our own experiences with men: from the weird to threatening, to behaviour that would be classed as criminal. Now, after Harvey Weinstein and #metoo, it is public and we at Trouble want to do something about it. On Monday evening, at 7 o'clock at the Groucho's Grenaro room, we are holding a group discussion about our own experiences.
At the end of the meeting we want to draw up name a Charter of Principles. These are the basic rules of engagement, meaning society will continue to function, dates will be fun, but people - in particular 'those' men we all know - can't say they didn't realise. Tickets are £8 and all that money is going to RapeCrisis England and Wales.
£8 per ticket, all proceeds go to Rape Crisis England and Wales
Monday 6 September 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
Trouble notes that the population of Europe is due to peak in 2050, and then gradually decline. The UK’s birth rate is 1.81 per woman - do the maths - male fertility is falling off a cliff, and that’s even before we get to the thorny question of how do you find a partner with a view to having a child? We’re heading towards a baby drought.
This talk’s going to be an in-depth look from experts at what’s happening to modern fertility, the ethics of bypassing the birds and the bees, and the economics of babymaking.
We will be joined by Dr Geeta Nargund, an IVF pioneer and fertility professional, Dr Vivienne Nathanson, current chair of the ethics committee at the Royal College of Gynaecologists and former director of professional activities at the British Medical Association and Belinda Brown, a research associate at UCL and a writer for The Conservative Woman.
£8 for members and one guest, £20 for non-members
Monday 18 September 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
With NHS manager Sarada Chunduri-Shoesmith, former NHA Party candidate Jack Monroe, doctor and co-chair of the Young Medical Women International Association and chair of the Young Fabian Health Network, Sonia Adesara
Apparently there's going to be £350 million going spare for the NHS after Brexit. Ho-ho. But, seriously, what are we going to be do about the NHS?
Some of us worship it, some of us wonder whether our problems have got too big for it. And, with so many people living longer, has it become a victim of its own success in keeping us alive for so long?
This evening is a look under the bonnet of the NHS, with those who know what they are talking about, plus a chance for a hearty and heartfelt debate about this key part of British life. Expect Jack to be particularly noisy.
And what would you do with that £350m?
£8 for members and one guest, £15 for non-members
Thursday 13 July 2017
7pm at the Soho Theatre
The Trouble Club has 15 free tickets to Soho Theatre's new play, Touch. Written, directed and starring Vicky Jones, the co-creator of Drywrite, the drama company behind Phoebe Waller-Bridge's hugely successful Fleabag, it follows the secret life of a 33-year-old who has everything and nothing at the same time.
Free event
Monday July 31 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
Our ever pluralistic habits, hobbies and pastimes can combine with the workplace hazards of presenteeism, impostor syndrome and lengthy commutes to create the grim feeling that there’s never quite enough time in the day to do everything or enjoy anything. Dolly Alderton, a writer who has just put the finishing touches to her debut book, Everything I Know About Love, will be in discussion with journalist Helen Nianias and ITV news anchor Charlene White on how to make a good balance of work, play and rest. Helen manages to cultivate not only a career but an entire flat full of plants in between stints reporting from the ground at various refugee camps across Europe and the Middle East, and Charlene White, who reports daily on the big issues affecting the UK, will be a voice of adult-ly reason and togetherness for our two just-about twentysomethings. Full disclosure, when we asked Charlene to attend, she did say: ‘I don’t think anyone has their shit together!’
£8 for members and one guest, £20 for non-members
Thursday June 8th 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
Where will you be for the count? To commemorate (an)other historic election night, The Trouble Club will host a screening of all the news, as it happens, at The Groucho Club. The show begins from the moment the polls close and will continue all night, following all the counts from St Ives to Shetland and Orkney and every swingometer from the Toriest of home counties to the bubbliest of the liberal metropolitan elite's enclaves. People of all political persuasions welcome.
Free event
Monday 25 May 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
We've been waiting a decade for this. Rowan Pelling, columnist and former editor of the Erotic Review, is back with a delicious new magazine on love and sex, The Amorist.
She will be presenting an evening of romance and sauciness with some of the contributors, and how to talk about sex in a time when internet porn dominates.
£8 for members and one guest, £20 for non-members
Monday 24 April 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
When everyone is competing for our eyeballs and our head space through mobiles and computers, there comes a point when you ask: "how did we come to this?" Providing the answer is Professor Julia Hobsbawm, the founder of Editorial Intelligence.
Fully Connected: Surviving and Thriving in an Age of Overload, out in April has already been named as one of the "big books" of 2017 by the Financial Times.
She will join Trouble to talk about drowning in data and how we manage our lives in response to it.
If you'd like a copy of Fully Connected signed, keep an eye on Trouble emails closer to the date for a special discount code on advance orders of the book.
£8 for members and one guest, £20 for non-members
Friday-Sunday 24-26 March 2017
at Brody House, Budapest
This is Trouble: the Europe Edition. Relations with our continental neighbours have been rather fraught this year. Let's go and make them a little worse by taking Trouble, and its gin-drinking abilities, to Europe. Only joking. Or may only half-joking....
Our first expedition is to Budapest, and it will be as you've never seen it before. And if you haven't been, you should definitely come to one of Europe's great capitals. Our host for the weekend is the stunning Brody House, a hotel and private members' club in the Palace Quarter of the city - quite a special place.
This will be a unique opportunity to see Budapest through the medium of its art, architecture, history and its people, and through personal tours of the city. Over breakfast and dinner we will be talking Brexit, Syria and, of course, women. Confirmed speakers include Jack Monroe and Kate Maltby, with many more to come. There will also be an opportunity to meet some rather special people from Budapest's cultural, political and business worlds. And in case that all sounds a little heavy, the bar at Brody House mixes a fine cocktail from about noon.
For more info, click on the picture of Brody House above and scroll down. If you've held Trouble membership in the past, please choose "Trouble Cardholder" for £120. If not, "Guest" for £135.
Wednesday 19 April 2017
7pm at the Corinthia Hotel, Whitehall
As the Donald Trump saga rumbles on, all eyes are now on France where Marine Le Pen is riding high in the polls with anti-EU and pro-sovereignty agenda. With elections just months away, will it be floundering Francois Fillon, smooth Macron, or will France get its first female president? And, if so, whither Europe?
Buzzfeed's Marie Le Conte and Benedicte Paviot, UK correspondent for TV channel France 24, lead the discussion. Come and join in.
*conducted in English, over a slap-up three-course dinner at the Corinthia Hotel on Whitehall Place, wine included.
£30 for members and one guest, £45 for non-members
Monday 27 February 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
This evening is going to change your life, just a little, and all in the right direction. Two of our speakers. Rachel Kelly and Gemma Cairney have worked out strategies for turning depression and unhappiness into something really positive, while Radio 4 regular Farrah Jarral talks about the meaning of happiness in our culture. The evening will be part-workshop, part-discussion and there will also be chance to share your own experiences.
Our speakers are, in no particular order of favouritism:
Farrah Jarral is a writer, broadcaster and inner-city GP. She made her radio debut in 2013 with a talk on cheekiness as a form of non-revolutionary resistance, and in 2016, wrote and presented a major BBC Radio 4 series on the history of her greatest passion: social and cultural anthropology. She is currently working on a Radio 4 documentary about the acceptability of grown ups playing, and writing a book on the human soul.
Rachel Kelly: fizzes with good energy, throws great dinner parties, loves life and yet, fifteen years ago, while a mother to young children, was floored by severe depression. Her journey back to mental health and well-being came first through poetry - you can read about it Black Rainbow - through simple steps in Walking on Sunshine. Now she’s turned her attention to how food nourishes the mind with her best-selling The Happy Kitchen, written with nutritionist Alice Mackintosh.
Gemma Cairney: You might well have heard Gemma spinning the discs on Radio 1, one of her many talents. No-one texts Joy in such cheery CAPS LOCK. For Heads-Up she’s going to bring out Open: A Toolkit for How Magic and Messed Up Life Can Be, a guide through the maze of growing up. It's aimed at young people but, actually, we reckon most of us still feel 14 faced with many of life's problems.
Please note, this is a longer evening than usual, but with a break in the middle.
£8 for members and one guest, £20 for non-members
Monday 13 February 2017
7pm at the Corinthia Hotel, Whitehall
“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
One of the many quotes attributed to Mark Twain, and he might liked to have claimed it for himself after the last year in politics.
You've probably got some strong views on this too. Come to dinner and we are going to thrash it out with some expert insights from journalists and PRs on astroturfing, clipping and virality.
The smart three-course dinner (normally £60 a head) is being laid on by the Corinthia, a lovely hotel with discreet charm between Embankment and Whitehall and they've even thrown in some wine to help get the conversation going.
£25 for members and one guest, £50 for non-members
Monday 31 January 2017
7pm at the Groucho Club
After a year in which many of us discovered we didn't understand our neighbours, now comes the moment to say what you really think. Leading the conversation will be: Nimco Ali, FGM campaigner, outspoken and fearless on her love for Zac Goldsmith; businesswoman and Brexit-fan Michelle Dewberry; and Sonia Sodha, an opinion shaper at the Observer and policy guru.
We want you, the audience, to be truthful - on your politics, feelings about immigration, freedom of speech and whether the EU was a pile of bunkum or not. No reading from a script - come and talk from the heart. And no earplugs in when you hear something you don't like.
This event is being held in Gennaro room of The Groucho and we are invited to the club for a drink afterwards.
£10 for members and one guest, £12.50 for non-members
7pm Monday 20th August, Groucho Club, Dean Street
Led by the Financial Times’ Chloe Cornish, we’re going to decrypt the world of crypto-currencies.
Is it worth having a portfolio of crypto as well as a portfolio career? Or is it just a made-up market? What's an ICO and where do you take your pick-axe to go mining? And why has this virtual currencies world sprung up, and how is bro-culture impacting who gets a way in?
£10 for members of Trouble (you may also book a ticket for a friend @£12)
£20 for non-members of Trouble
Please note, you have to be a paid-up member of Trouble for the reduced price tickets.
£10 for members of Trouble (you may also book a ticket for a friend @£10)
£20 for non-members of Trouble
Please note, you have to be a paid-up member of Trouble for the reduced price tickets.