Theatre Trip: Wicked! (And National Portrait Gallery)

WICKED

Apollo Victoria Theatre
Date: 1st August (Wednesday), 2:30pm
Seats: Stalls Row A 18-19

(With Karla!)

I had planned to line up for the day seats today on my own, but when on Monday Karla messaged me asking what I was up to and if I wanted to help her check off some of her summer to do list, I suggested she join me and we tick something else off together as well! So we met at the Apollo Victoria about 8:15, and were about 16 in the queue. Time passed very quickly when you have someone to talk to (and someone to hold your spot if you need to duck out of the line) and at 10 we went into the box office and snagged the last centre seats for the matinee, just as we had planned! We were on the right hand side of the centre block next to the aisle, such amazing seats with a brilliant view.

After picking up our tickets, we walked past Buckingham Palace, through St James Park to Trafalgar Square and the National Portrait Gallery. Actually, this was a really cool gallery, with all the artworks arranged so that when you enter the gallery you go up an escalator to the top floor and then work your way down through the galleries, which go in chronological order. You start with the Tudors, some of the earliest portraits which are really cool to see people you read about in history books painted in portraits which were mostly done during their lives.

Then there's a room for Stuarts, 18th century, Victorians, 18th century, war era and contemporary. My favourite areas were the Victorian paintings of the royal family, it was really nice to see portraits of Victoria and Albert together! The contemporary one was really cool too, with portraits of Roald Dahl, Beatrix Potter and many other names I recognised. It was a really great way to kill the time.

After that we picked up some Pret for lunch, stopping on the way back through St James Park to sit and eat in the sunshine. Then back to the theatre to get a program (£8!) and our seats just in time for the show.

I noticed a few new things in this performance - you would think after seeing a show more than a dozen times, it’d get old! But I keep noticing new things every performance. In this show the main thing I noticed was their accents - they all seemed to be using a strange hybrid accent where some words were super British sounding and some super American. I found it odd and a little off putting if I’m honest. The Doctor Dillamond actor and Fiyero (Chris Jarman and David Witts respectively) were both quite new, having only started about a week and a half ago. Doctor Dillamond was excellent, but I didn’t like Fiyero all that much. He sounded too generic pop instead of musical theatre, and he didn’t actually hit all his notes, which was disappointing. 

I really enjoyed Madame Morrible (Melanie La Barrie) and the Wizard (Andy Hockley) - I have found in the past those roles have a tendency to get cast for actors who are celebrities (Bert Newton is a classic example in Australia), however I find those actors don’t often have enough of a singing voice to pull off the role properly and speak too much. But both of these actors really could sing and they only spoke what I believe they were meant to and sang more. The Wizard in particular was really effective, I thought. Nessarose (Rosa O’Reilly) and Boq (Jack Lansbury) were quite good. I did think Nessa was a tad subdued during the main part of the show but then in her solo she really went for it and it was amazing!

G(a)Linda (Sophie Evans) was great, she hit every note right and had great emotion towards the end. You could really tell that she has a great relationship with her Elphaba and gave a really heartfelt performance. But for me, the standout performer was Elphaba (Alice Fearn). She was the main reason I knew I had to come back and see Wicked again soon, as I heard her perform at West End Live and was blown away by her Defying Gravity. And her songs were brilliant, with new riffs I hadn’t heard before and really strong voice. She also was a great actress who showed a lot of small emotions and things which maybe weren’t noticed by the people in row Z, but we’re certainly noticed and appreciated by me! I’m quite pleased I got to see her perform in the role.

And the perk of a matinee is, I can still get home in time for dinner and playing with the cat! What a great way to spend a Wednesday.