Normally around this time of year we all enjoy the schadenfreude of people who paid £20 a head to visit a "Santa Wonderland", usually near Lymington, only to find muddy tracks, sparse strings of fairy lights in a tree, and a drunk Santa in his grotto that's really a shed.
The best (or worst) of these was back in 2008, when "Lapland New Forest" so outraged punters that the owners were jailed for 13 months (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-12783389). Charlie Brooker wrote lovingly about this (contains swears from the outset): https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2008/dec/08/lapland-new-forest-christmas
Even when the event is big and successful, the papers can't help having a pop. Just look at "Winter Wonderland", the annual big-ticket event in Hyde Park.
Daily Mail 2022: "Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park is slammed for its 'rip-off' prices - including £8 for candyfloss and £7 for a potato on a STICK"
Daily Mail 2023: "Winter Wonderland slammed for 'rip-off prices' - with family-of-five spending almost £200 and revellers joking they need to re-mortgage their house afford an outing"
Read more: "Woman whose £685 Balenciaga trainers went missing when she went ice skating at London's Winter Wonderland claims staff told her she 'should feel grateful' after giving her Primark plimsolls to wear home"
But there's a new fiasco in town! Richard Curtis decided to cash in on his deeply problematic "rom-com" Love Actually, by creating a theatre experience called ... "Christmas, Actually"
From a celebrity newsletter: "Media reviews have not been kind, but nowhere near as bad as the ones from folks unlucky enough to actually pay for their tickets. We're told the only highlight of Thursday's show was Ruby Wax. It was so dire that even the ushers – who were paid to be there – were heard complaining. They told audience members to count their blessings, as they only had to endure it once. The ushers had to sit through it eight times. Still, it's all for a good cause. And Comic Relief will no doubt benefit hugely from the whopping 5% of net profits it's getting from the production it's billed as being in aid of."
Hope whatever you fork out £20 for is better than all of these!
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