168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 22, 2017 17:10:11 GMT
lol to opt out you have to phone the development office, not even the box office. I don't mind them charging a fortune to raise money for the theatre as it's a good way of fundraising and god knows theatres need it but at least be honest about it and don't say its optional.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 22, 2017 16:43:35 GMT
bit of a swindle they way they did this with an optional donation with no easy way of opting out of it, hardly optional then
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 17, 2017 10:06:07 GMT
Just announced it's extended the Manchester run until 29th April Yeah, they were always contracted to stay till the end of the month so they could say they extended due to popular demand despite both shows I went to being pretty empty. These fake extensions get on my nerves.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 16, 2017 10:54:16 GMT
I'll try to pop along later in the day!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 16, 2017 10:18:18 GMT
Yeah I'd agree with all that. Saw the play last night and enjoyed it a lot as the theatre banter and father character were so enjoyable. I'd agree that the concept is too obviously premeditated and some moments feel very on the nose, particularly the praying parts.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 11, 2017 18:04:36 GMT
Add mine to the piles of praise! So bloody good! And nice to meet another theatre board member, the badges do work!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 1, 2017 9:43:24 GMT
Saw this last night! Still high on the Meatloaf endorphins! Before I go any further this is gonna be a pretty in depth spoilerific post so please skip to the bottom if you want to go in fresh. It’s still really early in the run and I know they’re making changes during the four week preview period. Also I saw an understudy for Strat as the main guy has given himself Laryngitis which isn’t surprising considering the amount of belting. So overall it’s a hot mess, not a good musical but still very enjoyable if you like the music as it’s infectious. The set is pretty darn cool, {Spoiler - click to view} it’s a pyramid stage left and a two tier tunnel type thing stage right. The overall look is post apocalyptic but I’d say this is more Repo/Urinetown than WWRY. You can tell Schreib directs a lot of opera as theres some experimental stuff in there like the fact that the middle layer on the pyramid becomes Raven’s bedroom and we see all the action inside it projected by an onstage camera woman on to the rest of the set. For those of you sitting more than the first 12 rows of the stalls back who can’t see the upper part of the stage they have hung TV’s from the underside of the dress circle and show the camera work on them. This is an interesting technique but because the book is so bad, which I’ll get on to in a bit, it looks less like Ostermier and more like badly shot soap. Other things in the set, there’s a cool car at one point that gets pushed off the edge of the stage, there’s a nice little pond which is used to great effect and there’s even a couple of bats that fly. And then there’s the bikes. Ugh, this is one of my big hang ups, the bikes look like chairs disguised as bikes that move on and off on tracks, the wheels don’t even spin. In such a biker centric universe of Steinman you’d think they’d focus on getting the sound and smell of an engine even if they can’t get a real bike, they could try to make the wheels spin or something. Anyway at the end of ‘Bat Out Of Hell’, also the act1 break, when Strat crashes his bike the front wheel splits in half and opens out pneumatically, I laughed at that effect. Not sure if it was supposed to be symbolic or something but it was just weird. The cast are spectacular, there isn’t a week link, particularly Raven who is sexy as hell and has an effortless incredible rock belt. The ensemble are tight and strong and the parents of Raven very sexy and excellent singers though the dad (Falco) doesn’t have the acting chops to sell it just yet, he’ll get there I think. Ok so the major problem is the book/plot - {Spoiler - click to view} it’s the future, we don’t know why but it’s typical post apocalypse, there’s this group called The Lost, who are all stuck at a certain age, they don’t get old. This is led by Strat, the sexy and maybe bi-sexual leader. He has a friend/lover/brother couldn’t figure out which, called Tink, who is stuck as a young teen even though the actor looked early 30’s. His other best friends are a black couple who don’t really have distinguished characters other than the lady works as a nurse for Falco (traitor? but issue not explored) I think she was in love with Strat once but he didn’t love her back (2 out of 3 aint bad).
So Raven is the daughter of Falco, another badly drawn character, who is a tyrannical father and dictator who tortures the lost when he catches them but equally is just very in love with his wife who he is stuck with at middle age which he’s not happy about. That said they’re both pretty hot so if I got stuck looking like them I’d be happy. Essentially he finds out Raven’s been sneaking out and tries to find Strat and his mates, assumes strat is dead then arrests Strats mates and tortures them. Then his wife sets them free. Then Tink betrays Strat to lead Falco to Strat and ends up dying in the process, Strat immediately forgives dying Tink and lashes out at Raven who runs away. He then goes back for Raven and beats her dad up but for some reason she stays. Then suddenly some text that says 6 months laters and he’s back again for Raven and takes her away. The whole plot is messy and structured poorly. The characters aren’t introduced in any meaningful way that makes us root for them and Falco’s journey from tyrant to good husband really doesn’t make any sense. It could use a major re-write! The other thing about the book is it’s written in Steinman esque poetry, particularly when raven and Strat and Tink speak. It could be a cool device if they made a thing of it, like made it clear that that’s the language of the lovers or something but as it is it just seems pretentious. There is also a lot of contemporary dance, in act 1 when Raven and Strat have songs there is one dancer dressed similarly to the pair dancing behind them and I assumed this would come together in a big dance number or something like the ballet in West Side Story, but it really doesn’t, they just fade away. The ensemble do lots of these kind of moves throughout the show and it just looks quite out of place. The sound design and lighting is great, you can hear every word and as I said earlier it was fantastic to hear the songs played and sung so amazingly. It’s way better than WWRY, it may be immature and written like something scrawled in the back of an emo’s geography book but at least it’s earnest and ambitious. I hope it get’s there!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 22, 2017 22:00:35 GMT
I saw the first preview of this tonight. It's 3 monologues delivered through a trendy binaural microphone much like the one used in Complicite's the Encounter.
You sit in the dark in a room for the first monologue then move to a different room to sit in the dark for the second and then you get to stand in a room in the dark for the last one.
Mostly it's just the audio, in number 2 there's some lights coming on occasionally and during number 3 you do get to see John Macmillan for 5 minutes at the end.
The monologues themselves don't seem linked and are Ridley at his most allegorical/abstract. Apocalyptic tales, a boy who joins a gang, a dowdy guy who looks after an old lady who becomes under siege from people growing sledgehammers from their hands and an ostrich farmer with a miracle healing ostrich on the run from a bad man.
As you walk out you can see the havoc the actor has wreaked around the microphone breaking melons etc like a foley artist which just makes you more annoyed that you didn't get to see any of it. I think I'd rather have listened to it in the dark in my bedroom rather than schlep to Shoreditch for the pleasure.
Overall despite it being a nice walk through the mood lit underbelly of the town hall it's a bit of an underwhelming experience
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 19, 2017 19:59:42 GMT
I'd also like to see Dear Evan Hanson come over here!
|
|
168 posts
|
Junkyard
Feb 12, 2017 16:18:17 GMT
via mobile
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 12, 2017 16:18:17 GMT
New musical in Bristol from Headlong written by Shakespeare in love composer and Jack Thorne. It's about the construction of a playground in a deprived area in the 70's www.bristololdvic.org.uk/junkyard.html
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 9, 2017 22:19:22 GMT
Hmmmmm that's a confusing night of musical theatre and I'm glad I'm not a critic.
Strong, large cast that outnumbered the audience. The young recent drama school grads are particularly good. Some great choreography and choral work. Not much set to speak of, a set of ladders on wheels and a platform on wheels.
The material itself is just Bizarre! I feel it's trying to make a point about the whole world being mad but doesn't need two acts to do it. There's a few great songs in there which redeem it slightly but it's not what I'd call an an enjoyable show you can invest in emotionally.
Also the cartoonish portrayal of the mentally unstable seemed a bit offensive. It would likely have worked better it they'd acted normally or more subtly to emphasise the point that it's hard to tell who's sane.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 9, 2017 14:41:02 GMT
Off to see this tonight! Looking forward to it. Can't see the cast list online yet so a bit of a mystery!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 1, 2017 14:07:15 GMT
I saw it on Broadway, it's a nice enough romcom, reminded me of Copacabana. I can't remember that much about it which isn't a great sign. I think it's something that would benefit from a set/costume/staging as the story travels about a bit and features skydiving elvis impersonators at one point and a bizarre voodoo sequence. It's the sort of thing I'd see at the Southwark Playhouse but I won't jump at the chance of a concert.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Oct 29, 2016 14:43:03 GMT
So Lin is now settling into London! I'll be on the lookout for any cabaret spots or something, I'll be amazed if he can resist performing till October 2017
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Aug 14, 2016 7:22:18 GMT
I'm going, but I'm afraid its effect will be anaesthetised at the NT. Probably this would be much better seen on the road with a genuine audience. Sounds like it from the latter contradictory responses compared to those who have seen it in audiences that more accurately reflect the play. Some people really do not understand the working class, I mean, sneering at Cartwtight and Godber, two of the best chroniclers of such and Lee Hall's ancestors. I'm not from Scotland but I'm from this sort of small, dead end, no prospects town and era; to see this on a National Stage is far better than another David Hare, middle class hand wringing exercise. Is it documentary reality? Of course not, it's a hyper-real comedy/tragedy of feckless but, for those sympathetic to their background, admirable youth, doing something to escaoe what are mapped out to be limited lives. The excess, to me, becomes transcendent, even moving. I 'got out' as it were, many of my school colleagues never did. That they sneer at the posh Londoners is sad because it is based on lack of knowledge abd understanding, but their targets fulminating about these god awful people with their awful manners and lives are just as bad. I'm certainly not sneering, I grew up in a working class home in the north east and loved Godber and Cartwright. I just don't think this is very authentic and seemed lazy in its portrayal of class.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Aug 13, 2016 9:36:19 GMT
Late to the party but this is so bloody good! If they could harness the energy from this they could power enough midgey lamps to keep the entire audience safe
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Aug 13, 2016 8:55:47 GMT
This did very little for me, it's a bit of a throwback to the Godber/Cartwright tradition of a bunch of outrageous people on a night out. The songs don't add much and I found it really long and predictable.
There are a few points you think it's going to end but it just keeps going! And for me it takes more than shouting ''let's go mental' and jumping about to suggest genuine anarchic youth spirit. The girls are very talented and there is a really nice if morally dubious monologue where Orla describes essentially raping a dying man.
Maybe if you grew up in the period you could get on with this for a nostalgic night and there was a standing O but it was too much Our Day Out with Bouncers and not enough vintage Lee Hall for me.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Aug 11, 2016 9:17:16 GMT
in the meantime I keep getting targeted ads for this one night only screening of the Hedwig movie in the Brunel Shaft Tunnel, an atmospheric underground chamber, september 28th, might be tempted! www.facebook.com/events/623638381132193/
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Aug 3, 2016 7:57:49 GMT
I was a bit disappointed by this. I remember grinning ear to ear when I first saw Matilda so was hoping for the same elation with this but it doesn't quite have that mould breaking feeling. Don't get me wrong, it's enjoyable and there are numbers that are pure Minchin in terms of intelligently ridiculing things like alternative therapies and they do a good job of embracing the themes of monotony vs making the most of life.
For me it was just missing something in terms of originality and stand out numbers, the 2 best songs go to minor characters and one feels tacked on to appeal to the everyday sexism movement. It's definitely worth seeing but at the minute lacks the wow factor, I thought it was just me being my usual picky self but my two friends had the same opinion.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Jun 23, 2016 10:24:50 GMT
Here's my tuppence on it, full of spoilers but it's a spoiler thread right?.I came away from part 1 disappointed, I thought the effects were incredible but the whole thing lacked pace and was overwritten and too long. Particularly the second act of part 1 felt really long with the scene in the library between Scorpius and Albus feeling like an eternity.
The second part was much better, I enjoyed act 1 immensely and thought it really found its feet, there were a few great moments of staging in it, the tech really is amazing. At the interval I was ready to declare undying love for it but then in act 2 I felt it sagged a bit again. For me the issues with it are the big expositional bits where characters talk about exactly what they're going to do and why in case we didn't quite get it. There's not a lot of subtext and at times the father stuff hits you over the head too much. I really didn't like the actor playing Dumbledore/Diggory sr and so maybe that detracted from my enjoyment of the scene where Dumbledore has a heart to heart with Harry, I'm not quite sure I buy this convenient mirror of the harry/albus plotline coming from a portrait it seems so out of character for Dumbledore but the audience largely bought it and there was lots of sniffles. There was a scene where Scorpius tells Albus what he's learned during the play and vice versa that was entirely made of subtext and again with Harry and Albus at the end. I guess these things will improve as the script develops but at the moment that's what lets it down for me - the 'this is how I feel' and the 'this is how my character has changed during the story' dialogue which was a bit hamfisted. It probably should have ended when Hagrid reappears in Godric's Hollow
Didn't love the music either and sometimes the Tiffany staging reminded me too much of his other things and so that took me out of the wizarding world.
Sorry this has been nitpicking and a bit negative so far. I will say that overall I did enjoy it, it serves as a great dip into the world again and seeing your fav characters again is magical, the effects are out of this world great and worth going to see them alone. It's such a difficult task and they did better than I could do so I applaud the show. Would it work as a play if you didn't know Harry Potter? just about. Is this now canon? not necessarily, it feels like when they do cartoon spin offs of film franchises.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Jun 11, 2016 8:46:02 GMT
What a shame this is such a curiously underpowered and melancholic affair, it has glimmers of potential. I found it pretty boring, it's all taken so seriously but the music is nice and lyrics work well it just could have been done faster and more excitingly. The staging is a bit budget Complicite, complete with flapping umbrellas and while Crawford is convincing as Leo, he doesn't have the chops to make Butterfly soar, rather you worry he might rupture something trying to hit the final note.
I found it quite badly paced, you spend most of the first half waiting for something to happen, a lot of the second half thinking something is maybe happening and then the last 5 minutes trying to catch up with everything they've told you happened (in clunky exposition). It's a shame as I really want new musicals to succeed but I can't see it lasting long.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on May 20, 2016 7:41:26 GMT
Not much buzz about this considering it opens next week. On the website it claims
Now starring Michael Crawford in his first leading role in a musical for 20 years (having created the title roles in The Phantom of the Opera, and Barnum).
Is this actually true? I know Woman in White could be argued to be a supporting role but wasn't he a lead in Dance of the Vampires, or was that over 20 years ago?
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on May 4, 2016 8:52:48 GMT
This is SO FRICKIN GOOD! Man I haven't just sat and enjoyed a show without picking out its flaws and derivatives in such a long time so when a show like this surprises you and makes you feel like a kid again it's awesome. It's not the most lyrically refined show but it is so confident and expertly directed, there isn't an opportunity missed in design, direction or cast. I preferred this to Mormon, if you're on the fence do yourself a favour and book!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 29, 2016 13:01:47 GMT
Have you guys seen this awesome Hamilton/batman mash up
Also the first scene of the show sneakily recorded
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 24, 2016 21:58:43 GMT
isn't the point of this forum to create a space for theatre geeks to convene and if we can reward each other by sharing something like a priority booking code, why not? lest we buy into the elitist class system of the Old Vic, wealthiest first. The producers decided to follow this tiered approach to open the booking process gradually for different groups and personally, I think that should be respected. If they wanted everyone to use this promo code, they'd have opened public booking earlier. Yeah but doesn't it feel good to share a little bit of love amongst your likeminded friends? Maybe I'm too lefty but I think if you have taken the gumption to be registered on this forum, or even find this forum then you're enough of a theatre fan to warrant the early booking code regardless of what they producers intentions were.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 24, 2016 21:10:51 GMT
One posting removed. Guys, please don't post booking/promo codes that aren't intended for the general public. Ta. isn't the point of this forum to create a space for theatre geeks to convene and if we can reward each other by sharing something like a priority booking code, why not? lest we buy into the elitist class system of the Old Vic, wealthiest first.
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 10, 2016 9:34:38 GMT
Is Johnson a 'theatrical Maverick'? I'm a bit young to know much about what he did 30 years ago but his more recent work all seems very safe. Did love hysteria though.
Interesting subject matter, there's a great documentary that Nina Conti made about her relationship with Campbell, he clearly inspired a lot of people!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Mar 10, 2016 9:27:48 GMT
Really enjoyed this last night, it's a bit of a rarity as its a new show that really recalls goofy Broadway shows like batboy and honeymoon in Vegas.
It's a good bit of escapism with nice performances from Lipkin and co. Worth supporting to encourage people to make more new work!
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 26, 2016 22:27:53 GMT
oh wow, she's effectively a less attractive Mary Poppins but why not, I hope Wait and Bleed makes it in, it's a fav of mine
|
|
168 posts
|
Post by paplazaroo on Feb 23, 2016 23:59:33 GMT
Computer says no! Beyond the fence is beyond the pale. Just a few predictions of what the critics might say, didn't need an algorithm to work that out either.
Saw it tonight and it's not good. From what I can figure out it is based on a scenario thrown up by a computer and then uses music written by a computer. The sad thing is the score and setting are the best things about it, where it falls down is the plot, characters, dialogue and lyrics - the human generated part. Which is a shame because I really loved the Gay Wedding musical that the creators made previously for TV.
What we have is a bunch of women, all thinly drawn tropes, protesting in Greenham common. All the stereotypes are there, comedy fat northerner, angry black lesbian, julie walters-esque spunky old lady, sex crazed welsh woman straight out of Gavin and Stacey and our protagonist, militant feminist (because she was damaged by a man and actually learns all she needs is a good man) and her daughter who doesn't speak (no prizes for guessing what she overcomes near the end).
spoilers ----
They mill about singing songs about their passion for ending nukes for most of the show without much in the way of action, they have an argument,the protagonist hates the leading man until during a song she concedes that she is in love with him of course, their angry leader has a bizarre death and the kid comes out and sings a really eloquent song with too many words in it, which is the point, but it's still hackneyed.
You don't need a computer to see that there is a formula for writing a musical like this, showstopper worked it out ages ago and they make it up on the spot with a less obvious A B rhyme scheme. The cast all do their best but it's tricky to overcome the dodgy lines where everyone says exactly what they're feeling and subtext is nowhere to be seen.
An interesting experiment but not a great show
|
|