'We will survive' - how City entertainment zone can't wait to welcome Alan Carr back with open arms

It's almost a year since top comedian Alan Carr was sitting outside of the Glee Club in his car - only to be told to drive back home.

Now the boss who gave the Chatty Man star his marching orders can't wait to see his headlights back in the Queensway Tunnel.

That's because without stars like him to add some colourful zest to centres like the Arcadian and Birmingham Hippodrome, the whole area just feels lifeless.

Instead of performing a warm-up show to get his funny bones in order, the Dorset-born Carr was a first-night victim of the original lockdown in March, 2020.

That's when Glee Club founder Mark Tughan had to tell him not to unpack his bags.

Today, there are posters of other comedians in the window of the Glee Club promising more undeliverable gales of laughter in time for the first anniversary of that sad night.

Like the one for Canadian star Tom Stade's February 23 date which prophetically says: "You ain't seen nothing yet!"

Laugh? We could almost cry!

But even though the third lockdown since March 2020 means there's going to be no joking in the bleak midwinter, all is not lost.

Three of the leading lights of one of the city's top entertainment districts today joined forces to issue a Gloria Gaynor-style clarion call: "We will survive!"

And that means food, drinks, parties and comedy routines will one day be firmly back on the menu in Southside - the collective name for the city's theatreland, Chinatown and gay quarter based in and around Hurst Street.

Pride director Lawrence Barton, restaurant owner James Wong and Glee Club founder Mark Tughan today join forces with BirminghamLive to offer a sense of optimism for the future despite the uncertainties surrounding the battle to tame the Covid-19 virus.

Lawrence, who runs the Nightingale Club, Loft and Village Inn, said that in offering hope for the future he was especially thinking of the "isolated" members of the gay community's need to socialise.