Old Red Lion Theatre, Angel  

The ideal spot to sink your life savings in producing and premiering the play what you wrote - and then drown your sorrows on the proceeds of the handful of tickets you actually managed to sell. The little theatre upstairs probably seats no more than 50 but is a lively, vibrant venue. Some great stuff and some mind-blowing rubbish gets put on there. The whole place has a theatrical, arty air but it is also a first-class local boozer. So you'll find the bottle-nosed middle managers from the nearby offices necking it down at one end of the bar while actor wannabes giggle and shrill down the other - all interspersed with locals of all types enjoying the draft Pride, Broadside, Abbot, Leffe and Staropramen. The décor could come from a set-designer's template - that heavy old embossed wallpaper with generations of dull-red (for the walls) and essence of nicotine (for the ceiling) paint layers, comfortable benches running round, a scattering of tables and chairs and plenty of space for those who prefer to stand and bray at one another. Our fear is one day they'll probably gentrify this place - and the world will be poorer for it.

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