The Rise and Fall of Little Voice - UK Tour

Christina will be excellent in this. Shame about the venue selection though, there's nothing near me 😩

Age-wise Christina is about 5 years older than Jane Horrocks was in the film. Jane was 28 at the time of the stage version.

Frankly bizarre casting, even though I'm a big fan of both women individually.

It's performing nowhere near where I live (Midlands very neglected on this schedule) so I doubt I'll catch it anyway

I mean it's a stage version and Christina Bianco is perfect casting in terms of the skillset she's best known for.

If she's a little old, it's a UK tour bringing a talented performer out into the country where other audiences can see her, it's still a good thing.

Shobna is 54 and Christina is 39. Quite likely that Mari had her at 15. Makes it somewhat more poignant that LV is still at home and with few friends in her 30s imo.

Actually I saw yesterday's matinee in Horsham, which was well-attended; I think there must have been last-minute bookings, maybe word-of-mouth though I kept checking for offers and found none. I'd seen the original stage production and the film but no other version and hadn't realised there had been revivals, but was reflecting that casting the lead must be difficult and therefore limit the options.

Anyway, the whole thing was very well done and some of the audience members (I was one) gave it a standing ovation at the end. It's a shame the characters are all so cartoonish meaning that as I've said of other shows, this is almost like a panto out of season, and Christina Bianco is old enough to play LV's mother, not LV herself, but it's not that obvious and of course she nails all the songs; the concert scene in Act 2 was pin-drop stuff.

It was a shock to find the tickets so expensive (and no senior discounts, not even for the midweek matinee); double what I usually pay in London or at other regional venues and more than I paid for a couple of big shows (The Osmonds and Waitress) in Woking recently, even with the steep ATG fees for those, but it was such a refreshing change to go to somewhere other than London for the theatre and Horsham is a very attractive town in its own right. Unfortunately most of the stage shows are lesser tours and one-nighters so despite living in the area for 40+ years, I don't think I'd ever been to the theatre part of the complex.

So if you've never seen this, or not recently, it's great for entertaining, undemanding escapism.

Not sure if this is really a spoiler but 

I’m going when it arrives at the Lowry. Last time I saw this play was at the Royal Exchange almost 20 years ago with Corrie’s Denise Welsh as the mother and Roy Barraclough as Mr Boo. I don’t remember who was LV but I do remember liking it. I think it might have been just before I relocated from Sheffield to Manchester so I might have come over specifically for it. On a train.

Anyway I know CB is a bit old for it but I hear Cilla has been incorporated so looking forward to see how she pulls that one off!

I went tonight.
It was good, especially Christina and Shobna, but as a play it is feeling extremely dated