musicals
Marianka Swain
The theatre gods rained down not fire and pestilence, but a 45-minute technical delay on opening night of this substantially revised musical – a stage adaptation of the 1998 DreamWorks animated movie. But nothing could entirely halt this juggernaut; fittingly, for a show that earnestly values persistence and the unstoppable power of the epic.The story remains essentially faithful to its Biblical source, following Moses (Luke Brady, pictured below with Christine Allado) – child of a Hebrew slave family – from his fortunate adoption by Queen Tuya (Debbie Kurup), who finds him floating Read more ...
Matt Wolf
This latest musical theatre exercise in “geek chic” has been an American phenomenon: a show propelled by social media that developed a rabid fan base taking it all the way to Broadway last year. And here Be More Chill now is in London at The Other Palace, previously home to Heathers – another American musical about the psychological torture inherent in being a teen – and arriving in time to suggest Dear Evan Hansen on amphetamines, but with much familiar pushing of buttons where an honest appeal to the heart might be.Not that the adoring public for this lunatic sci-fi paean to normalcy will Read more ...
Marianka Swain
“Take our country back!” is the rallying cry of the self-identified “real” Americans gathered to protest the arrival of immigrants. It could be a contemporary Trump rally – or, indeed, the nastier side of current British political discourse – but in fact this scene is from a 1986 musical, set in 1910, from an all-star creative team: book by Joseph Stein (Fiddler on the Roof), score by Charles Strouse (Annie) and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz (Wicked). Despite that pedigree, it bombed on Broadway, but this opportune revival, transferred from Manchester’s Hope Mill Theatre, gains potency by Read more ...
aleks.sierz
Do you hear the people sing? In recent months, you're more likely to have heard news stories about the longest running West End musical than the actual music. Stephen Sondheim – who celebrates his 90th birthday in March – missed the gala opening of the venue which has been renamed after him (formerly the Queen's), due to a fall – and some Les Mis singers have been pulling out as rapidly as champagne corks. At one point, Matt Lucas stepped in as a substitute, only to fall sick himself. Celebrity gossip aside, producer Cameron Mackintosh dumped the legendary Trevor Nunn and John Caird Read more ...
David Nice
How is it that, in the nearly 900 pages of Sondheim's collected lyrics with extensive comments Finishing the Hat and Look, I Made a Hat, with numerous special boxes celebrating other composers and lyricists, he managed to mention Jerry Herman only once, and in passing? Most perceptions of their differences overstate the case: Sondheim could write big, generous melodies as rich as Herman's, Herman's lyrics can be as literate and as laugh-out-loud funny as Sondheim's, and invariably they fit the tune just as well (chances are higher when, like these two and Cole Porter, you do both).With Herman Read more ...
Rachel Halliburton
Despair hangs like mildew over the small iron-ore mining town of Duluth, Minnesota, where dreams go to die, and the living haunt the clapped-out buildings like lost souls. This poignant collaboration between playwright Conor McPherson and Bob Dylan – himself born in Duluth in 1941, seven years after this play begins – takes us into a community in which music provides a rare release for individuals scavenging for reasons to stay alive. It was something of a surprise for McPherson to be approached by Dylan to create a theatrical vehicle for his music; when asked why he thought he had been Read more ...
Nick Hasted
Tom Hooper’s freakily phantasmagoric visualisation of an already strange West End smash is a high-wire act risking the sniggers which greeted its trailer. And yet it never falls, sustaining a subtly hallucinatory, wholly theatrical reality. Doubling down on the bizarre unlikelihood of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s original adaptation of T.S. Eliot’s poems, this is an extreme fantasy vision blooming from the composer’s resolutely mainstream world.Putting plainly human faces and bodies into digitally created cat costumes could be an absurd throwback. Instead, the excellent cast ache with palpable Read more ...
Matt Wolf
Who knew? This West End premiere of the 2007 Broadway entry from the legendary songwriting team of John Kander and Fred Ebb (Chicago, Cabaret) secured a prime holiday-season slot at the last minute when this playhouse's previous entry, The Man in the White Suit, closed prematurely. And the happy if unexpected news is that Paul Foster’s touring production – Wyndham's, unusually, is another stop on the road – is a pure delight. Curtains may not be the subtlest or most nuanced musical you’ll ever see, but it’s without a doubt one of this year’s most thoroughly Read more ...
Matt Wolf
There’s slight (White Christmas, to name but one) and then there’s The Boy Friend, a period musical so unabashedly vaporous that if you sneeze, it might blow away. All credit then to the Menier Chocolate Factory for anchoring Sandy Wilson’s onetime theatrical mainstay in a sustainedly nostalgic billow of song and dance to draw attention away from the fact that comparatively little of consequence happens across three acts. Matthew White's production would seem to be predicated on the assumption that nature abhors a vacuum, in which case, when in doubt, dance – and why not? Read more ...
Matt Wolf
Nostalgia for things that probably never were is an animating theme in politics these days. Much the same feeling displaced to the realm of showbiz, lends a vaguely dampening air to White Christmas, this latest stage retread of the 1954 Bing Crosby-Danny Kaye film that its beloved more for its songs, really, than for any inherent durability.The Dominion hosted a colourless iteration of this very title five years ago, with Aled Jones and Tom Chambers in the bromance-heavy central roles. The current upgrade of the material benefits from an altogether more appealing cast, headed by Danny Read more ...
Demetrios Matheou
Frozen is possibly the most beloved Disney movie since the studio rediscovered its mojo in the 1990s. While picking up a couple of Oscars and laying waste to box office records, it had young girls immersing themselves in favourite characters and performing the songs on a dime.A sequel to that 2013 film was inevitable. And so with the same production team, composers and stars, we’re returning to Arendelle and its two royal sisters – one with magical powers, the other some good old-fashioned gumption, who make a formidable team when they’re not immersed in sibling squabbles. But Read more ...
theartsdesk
Aladdin, Prince Edward Theatre ★★★ Disney's latest blockbuster film-turned-stage show remains airborne – justCome From Away, Phoenix Theatre ★★★★ 9/11-themed musical crosses the Atlantic, capacious heart intactDear Evan Hansen, Noël Coward Theatre ★★★★ A stirring new musical that tackles missed connections in the internet age will steal your heart. Until 2 MayEverybody's Talking About Jamie, Apollo Theatre ★★★★ Triumphant West End transfer for this big-hearted, inclusive and utterly joyful British musicalGhost Quartet, Boulevard Theatre ★★★★ Both mystical and alcoholic Read more ...