ALW's Cinderella - Gillian Lynne / U.K. Tour (rumour)

I’d have liked to have seen Artaud’s take on ‘Blood Brothers’, but not from the stalls.

They're going to open in a week? With the director split between 2 shows? Thats an interesting tactic to say the least.

Can they re-mount Pimlott’s version instead then?

Can anyone advise about the "timed" entry? Emails from LW state there is a timed entry slot but on the confirmation email it simply states 18:45 to be seated for 19:00. Do we really have to sit for a full 30 minutes pre-show?

Timed entry appears to be standard on tickets now for all theatres. I've ignored every single one of them and turned up 5 minutes before curtain with no issues for every production I've been to since reopening.

Just got the email literally as I was reading this. I’m still going next week on the 7th, but they have moved me from Stalls M39 to… Stalls M38… well I suppose I can live with that lol!

I found it useful to get a bigger looser mask for train and cinema trips, though still prefer a plainer dark one for theatre.

I keep being tempted to book a speedy revisit to this but am also keen to wait for the alternate (nothing against Carrie, I love seeing multiple casts)

Okay, I tried to be succinct but it didn't really work:

This is an absolute mess of a show (although it does have an award-worthy performance in it).

The big problem I think actually lies with Emerald Fennell and her truly terrible book. It's crass, crude and vulgar in so many places (what's with all the unnecessary swearing in a show that had a lot of children in the audience? The word 'Cinderella' sells to a family audience and they know that, but it was just vulgar) I don't understand the Fennell hype (I also thought Promising Young Woman was a mess because the screenplay was so bad - but then she won an Oscar so....!) Couple of points that really irritated me were:

1. If you're going to make the Prince gay/pan/whatever - DO SOMETHING WITH THAT. He's absent for the whole show, is not spoken about for at LEAST 90 minutes and then suddenly appears, half dressed and then marries his lover. A bizarre bolt on that added absolutely nothing to the story.
2. Godmother - so she's a plastic surgeon? Fine, but tell us something about her. The song she has at the end of act 1 tells us nothing about her, or her motivations. She just IS, and to me that's not good enough.
3. It's like everyone who works for ALW (including the work experience kid) was asked how they would update Cinderella and they used ALL the ideas. Because there is so much going on in this show, but even then it still feels like they did the absolute bare minimum to come up with an interesting concept. There is a good story somewhere in there, but you'd need to completely start again, and have 2 or 3 solid ideas and flesh them out properly, rather than 45 that all amount to nothing. and they have 2 weeks of previews to do that in, and it aint gonna happen.

On top of that is ALW's worst score to date. Rebecca Trehearn's big number in Act 1 with all the half naked men (something for the gays and gals to look at I suppose) is literally the same verse repeated approximately 11 times. The Stepsisters first song I couldn't understand a word of because they were singing so fast and over each other it was impossible to pick out anything they were saying. And the 11 o'clock number (Far Too Late?) is AWFUL. It's structurally wrong and in the wrong place. I Know I Have A Heart is the 11 o'clock number but it's in the wrong place.

(Minor bug bear but why is this show not automated? The stage crew coming on all the time to move the set was most off-putting and really took you out of the show)

It's funny that every single review/comment I'd seen up until I went last night didn't mention Carrie at all, and I wondered why... and it's because she's hardly IN IT! If she got 90 minutes stage time in a 2 hour 40 show I'd have been shocked. Which again up-ends the show when you're central character is essentially a supporting role. She's fine and sings well, but just isn't in it enough to be a 3D character. there are multiple chunks of 20 minutes where she just...isn't in it!

the stand-out by a mile is Victoria Hamilton-Barritt, who (as a friend put it) is playing Jennifer Saunders playing Glenn Close as Cruella De Vil - and it works a TREAT. I was HOWLING with laughter at quite how hysterical she is in this. A real star turn.
Otherwise, the cast as a whole are very forgettable (which is a shame because people like Rebecca Trehearn and Laura Baldwin are usually good value but...nope) - thought the Prince was the definition of 'fine' but I couldn't work out why he'd been cast (until he starts dancing near the end and then I understood.)

It just frustrated me more than anything, because there's a glimpse of an idea that has scope to be a good show. It's just structurally and musically wrong, and they're too far down the road to make any serious changes to it that could actually fix it (unless they do a Love Never Dies and shut it for a week and completely re-hash it)

That said, was on the moving chairs for the ball which is a nice gimmick. £100 is a rip off though - glad to have got one for £29!

It's so bad that I'm going back again tomorrow just to be sure it's as bad as everybody keeps telling me it is.

Though I rather enjoyed the silliness of it all when I went to the first preview. I wasn't expecting Hamlet or Les Mis. I see Cinderella as being ALW's 2021 attempt at Joseph-type daftness in terms of fusing style over substance.

I'll try and watch with a more critical eye this week and see if I can spot the rot that bothers others so much.

ceebee I’ll be very interested to read if much has changed in a week.

The one thing people seem to agree on is that it’s years since ALW’s turned out a classic show, and yet they seem to have gone in expecting one anyway, even after Mr Hot Buns and talk of Magic Mike dance sequences. All I want it to do is keep me entertained for two and a half hours. If it does that I’ll be happy.

For me, that has summed up so many shows over the past few years, Made in Degenham, Mrs Henderson Presents, Bend It Like Beckham, Motown, Tina, to name a few. Just dull.

ALW should go back to doing big, lush, sung through stuff. I don't think he's written anything outstanding since Sunset. Although I am singing 'Only You, Lonely You' alot, but i keep going into Evermore Without You, because they sound similar.