Theatre Trip: Bill Bailey - Larks in Transit

BILL BAILEY: LARKS IN TRANSIT

Wyndham’s Theatre
Date: 17th December (Monday), 8:00pm
Seats: Stalls, Row A 8
(with Jess!)

Notes: Bill Bailey is a comedian who I have enjoyed for many years, and when I first heard that he was coming to London I was. very pleased and tried to book tickets with Richard. Problem was, Richard was heading to Australia a week before me and that meant we were away for pretty much the whole run... Although I had a week after he left. So I messages Jess and asked her if she wanted to come. We decided Monday night was the best idea, and though I was unable to get tickets on TodayTix, Jess scored the last few Rush on the front row!

It turned out to be a crazy busy Monday and we by the time we met for dinner, I was thinking about bailing on the whole evening because it felt like just too much. But I sucked it up and in the end it was everything I needed and more. I had a chance to debrief over the meal and then we headed straight to the theatre.

It was at the Wyndham’s, which I had been to before to see Don Juan in SoHo with David Tennant in. This time, the state was set up with a range of musical instruments. Bill Bailey is just so hilarious!!! His show was based on travel stories from his personal life and his interests, which is how it ended up with routines about bird songs in pop music, Theresa May 90s house music, and a snippet of what it would be like to live your life with a death metal soundtrack. It’s hard to explain, you know, you had to be there to really get it... I know that makes for a bad review though!

My cheeks were so sore after only 10 minutes from all the laughing and there were tears on multiple occasions. It was an amazing night and the perfect anthesis to the day I’d had. I only hope it comes out on DVD so that I can share it with Richard and my family.

Theatre Trip: Chicago

CHICAGO

Phoenix Theatre
Date: 6th December (Thursday), 7:30pm
Seats: Dress Circle, Row J 17
(with Jess and Karla))

Notes: This was a show I was very excited to see, as I have always been a fan of the movie and know it super well. I only had a few weeks before I go to Australia for Christmas, as it closes on the 5th of January and that’s also the day we get back from our trip! So it was down to the few weeks before Christmas. There were no discount tickets available on TodayTix for this show, but TKTS has a 30% discount on a range of tickets. So I headed into the city on my way home on the Tuesday to pick up tickets for the Thursday night. I was hoping for stalls seats, but they only had 2 together and we needed 3, so the dress circle it is.

On Thursday night, we met for Mod Pizza (first time in ages, and oh so good) before heading up to the theatre. Our seats were in the back few rows of the dress circle, but the view was pretty great. A bit further back than I normally like, but no restriction on our view.

I was surprised how the show was actually more different to the film than I had realised. There were a few numbers I didn’t know (like Me and My Baby), which was a bit strange, and some of the characters were developed quite differently (like Mary Sunshine, who has a bigger role in the musical and her own plot twist). The staging was very minimalist in design, with the band on stage and a row of chairs either side. This shrunk the size of the stage and meant it felt like a cabaret show rather than a fully staged production. In fact, this works in its favour, as it gives it a 20s pared back vibe.

The performances were solid, but I didn’t feel as if there were any standouts. Sarah Soetaert (Roxie Hart) was actually better than I expected her to be based on the opening number. She was actually rather funny and hit all her laugh lines (although the audience didn’t seem to get them all), and I loved how sassy Josefina Gabrielle (Velma Kelly) was. She was the most like her film character, I think. Paul Rider (Amos Hart) was great and had everyone’s sympathy for Mister Cellophane as well as the rest of the show. The current draw for ‘famous person in Chicago’ is Todrick Hall, who I don’t know at all. His acting was great and vocally he was very strong, but he clearly comes from a pop singing background rather than musical theatre, and it didn’t quite gel with the tone of the show. There were two standout performances for me. One was Mazz Murray (Matron Mama Morton - all those M’s!), who I had seen before back in 2008 in We Will Rock You (she played Killer Queen and was great). Her performance was just sexy enough and she has a brilliant rasp to her voice which she was able to pull out, as well as a huge deep belt which blew me away. Her accent did let it down a little though (I think that was true in general, as the 20s Chicago accent is quite grating to listen to) but I think her performance was one of the best. The other performance which I really enjoyed was A D Richardson (Mary Sunshine). Aside from Mary Sunshine having a bigger role in the show than in the movie, vocally she was absolutely brilliant, with a massive range and crazy over-the-top enthusiasm for reformed sinners. I definitely didn’t see the twist coming though (no spoilers here!)

I think the absolute best thing though was the band. On stage for the whole show, there were spaces for the actors to fit in with the band for some parts of the show, and the were such a great band. They also really hammed it up and enjoyed every second of being on stage. I do think its a great sign (but a bad one for the cast, I guess) when the band gets a bigger cheer at the end than the cast at the curtain call! They really enhanced the atmosphere overall and added to the experience.

All in all, I’m glad I went but I definitely don’t need to go again. Worth it once though!

Hoping my next trip will be to see Bill Bailey do comedy (before Christmas), then home to Australia for Christmas!

Theatre Trip: Heathers #2

HEATHERS

Theatre Royal Haymarket
Date: 9th November (Friday), 7:45pm
Seats: Stalls K 15-16
(with Jess N again!)

Since last seeing Heathers, I have entered the lottery many many times and not won again - but Jess has won several more times! I haven't been able to go with her since because I haven't been super well but I have really wanted to. So finally, I got my chance, when she won again on Friday and invited me and I was actually well enough!

I think seeing as it's been more than a month since I saw it last, the cast have really grown into their roles. In particular, I felt that Jodie Steele (Heather Chandler) and T'Shan Williams (Heather Duke) had really improved on their roles.

A few actors have changed since the last time I saw it. Nathan Amzi now plays Ram's Dad and I thought he was fantastic! Also Amy Booth-Steel is now playing Miss Fleming, as Rebecca Lock has left the cast for another show. She was very funny and made an excellent ad-lib when confronting Steve, who was a 'silver fox'. 

I had forgotten how amazing this show was and thoroughly enjoyed it again. Jamie Muscato (JD) and Carrie Hope Fletcher (Veronica Sawyer) were absolutely incredible. They make a lovely pair and vocally fit so so well together. I can't wait to have the cast recording so I can listen to them whenever I like.

So, I think once more before it closes on the 24th if I can manage it, and then I'm going to have to move on with my musical theatre life.

Theatre Trip: Shakespeare Schools Festival

SHAKESPEARE SCHOOLS FESTIVAL

Shaw Theatre
Date: 7 November (Wednesday), 7:00pm
Seats: Stalls K 22-28

This was a very special performance to attend. The Shakespeare Schools Festival is something some of the students of my school have been preparing for for months. 3 of my students were in the performance group and the night for performing was Wednesday! 

As part of the performance, there were 3 schools performing. First up was a special school doing Romeo and Juliet. Each school had condensed versions of the scripts to perform from, so each play became a half hour performance. The first was much funnier than the original (mostly due to the actors rather than the play itself) and was not terribly well performed, but they did their best.

The second school I really enjoyed - it was a secondary school performing a version of Midsummer Nights Dream. It was really lovely and featured a very stubborn Helena, and an athletic Puck who danced and flipped her way around the stage very gracefully.

After interval it was our turn, with my school performing Macbeth. They created a really dynamic beginning sequence which showed all the groups of characters. Of the 3 students I teach who were in the production, one was one of the witches, and she did an amazing job! Another got to die dramatically in a swordfight onstage and lie there pretending to be dead for several minutes, which he did very dramatically. The third had a speaking role, which he did really well. All the students did a great job and made a fantastic production.

A really interesting evening and lovely to support our students for the evening.

Theatre Trip: Heathers

HEATHERS

Theatre Royal Haymarket
Date: 25th September (Tuesday), 7:45pm
Seats: Stalls K 17-18
(with Jess N!)

Heathers is a cult show which I primarily know about because of it's star, Carrie Hope Fletcher, who I follow on Youtube. It recently had a sold out run at the Other Palace, with an online lottery you could enter once a week in order to win tickets for the following week, however throughout the 9 week run I didn't win once! So I was overjoyed to hear that before the first run had even closed there was a second run announced, this time for the Theatre Royal Haymarket. And the lottery was on TodayTix! So every day I entered the lottery, and it wasn't until Tuesday I found out I had won!

I quickly got onto my friends (Richard had a work thing on), cranked out as much work as I could, then headed into the city for a quick dinner with Jess before the show. The theatre is a lovely little one which really only hosts plays and smaller productions - I had been last year to see Venus in Fur, and Heathers has only 18 in it's cast and very minimal set. There isn't a bad seat in the house, and we got in Row K near the middle. Great seats!

The plot of Heathers is the same as the cult film which it is an adaptation of (although I haven't seen the film yet). Veronica Sawyer wanted to be like one of the popular girls (the Heathers, so named because they are Heather, Heather and Heather!) and when she forges a note to get them out of trouble, they take her under their wing and she becomes popular. Then she falls for the brooding new boy JD at school, and between the Heathers causing destruction and JD being a psychopath, it all escalates quickly in a spate of 'suicides'. I don't want to give too much away to those who might not have seen it, because it is a phenomenal plot which is much more powerful if you don't see it coming.

The music is quite typical contemporary pop, with some gorgeous harmonies and the lyrics are so real but poetic. The whole show is definitely a dark comedy - we laughed a lot - but the subject matter is not for joking, really. My favourite songs are (I think) Never Shut Up Again, Lifeboat, and Seventeen. Seventeen is perhaps the most beautiful haunting song in the show, and the album has been on repeat for the last few days!

With a small cast, they really each get a chance to shine. All the adult roles are multiplied (with each actor playing 2 or 3), but the teenagers are all in the show a lot and only have one role each. Ram Sweeney (Dominic Andersen) and Kurt Kelly (Christopher Chung) made a hilarious if cringy pair as the jocks on the football team, Martha Dunnstock (Jenny O'Leary) was poignant as the beaten down and bullied student, and Shine a Light was a brilliant number thanks to the hilarious Ms Fleming (Rebecca Lock) and her adlibbing about Steve (an audience member who she claims she has been having an affair with) in every show!

The Heathers were all so perfect. Heather McNamara (Sophie Isaacs, in yellow) is the perfect perky but not-so-smart head cheerleader who finds her way to the right thing in the end and has the best jokes of the Heathers (she also gets to sing Lifeboat, which I adore). Heather Duke (T'Shan Williams, in green - mostly) is downtrodden and mostly ignored, until she gets her moment (Never Shut Up Again, a number after my own heart) and then she blew me away! And then there is Heather Chandler (Jodie Steele), the 'mythic bitch'. She has an incredible role which is bigger than I expected and is truly one of the original mean girls. Also her voice was absolutely insane. She is an absolute powerhouse!!!

The leading man in the show is Jason Dean, known as JD. He is totally a psychopath, but also desperately trying to be 'normal', in the same way other teenagers do. He just goes about it the total wrong way. Jamie Muscato plays JD brilliantly, as he manages to be sexy and yet also totally creepy. His voice was perfect in his duets with Veronica and had a longing quality which was so poignant.

And then there was Veronica Sawyer, as played by Carrie Hope Fletcher. Don't get me wrong, I love Carrie already but she absolutely blew me away. I last saw her live in the Addams Family, but Heathers is a whole other level when you play Veronica. She is only off stage for one scene and one song - the rest of the time she is on stage, acting, singing her heart out - and it's a massive sing! Carrie had an incredible energy, her voice is gorgeous and she was emotional and hysterical and flawless. My favourite numbers of hers are definitely Seventeen (duet with JD) which has the most haunting harmonies, and Dead Girl Walking. I draw inspiration from Carrie for being a positive role model, especially in Dead Girl Walking, in which she creeps into JDs bedroom and beds him. She is full of agency and self-awareness, and she rips her shirt off in the number in a way which celebrates all teenage girls, but especially those who (like Carrie) are not a tiny size. She is chubby and proud and gorgeous.

The end of the show had me in tears of being overwhelmed about how beautiful the show was and the hopeful ending which it still has despite everything that happens. I have never screamed so loud or danced as much at a curtain call, and I was the only person (at first) to join in the fist pumps at the end. And then, after a minute to calm down, Jess and I went to the front of the theatre where we met most of the cast. We got autographs, gushed at every single cast member, and promised we would do our best to be back to see it again. Carrie was even at stage door, and she is the loveliest - she even let us have pictures! The only major cast member we didn't get to meet was Jodie Steele, but that's fine.

Now, I need to win the lottery some more. My life needs more Heathers. How very.

Theatre Trip: As You Like It

AS YOU LIKE IT

Shakespeare's Globe Theatre

Date: 23rd August (Thursday), 2:00pm
Seats: Yard (Standing)

This was something I meant to do last summer, but I finally found a great show and a good time. As You Like It is one of the comedies and I wanted to catch a matinee because you stand outside, exposed to the elements. And luckily, I was able to go for a run in the morning, have it rain quite heavily around 9:30, but be clear and sunny by 1:00! Perfect weather for the outside theatre.

I started my day out by walking from Waterloo station along the Southbank, through the food market (getting my favourite duck fat french fries with truffle mayo), to the Tate Modern where I browsed the shop and admired the architecture until show time.

I had paid the grand sum of £5 for a yard standing ticket, so arrived around 1:40 to get my spot. I made a friend while I waited named Tegan who had arrived from the States that day and was directing this play next year with children, which was quite interesting to get her perspective on some things.

The plot of As You Like It is rather confusing. Essentially, it is about two cousins (Rosalind and Celia) who are banished into the forest, where Rosalind dressed as a boy (Ganymede) to avoid being attacked and they meet the man (Orlando) who Rosalind loves. She, while pretending to be Ganymede, tests Orlando's love for her by trying to persuade her that she doesn't. Along the way there are two warring brother Dukes, a fool and his love, a sad lonely man, and in the end, a quadruple wedding by the goddess Hymen (yep, that's her name). It's all a bit bonkers but somehow still fun and has a lovely happy ending!

In this production, there were elements of genderblind casting. In particular, the Dukes were played by a woman, Audrey was played by a man (although I get the impression that happens in many productions), but more importantly both Orlando and Rosalind were swapped - Orlando played by a girl and Rosalind as a boy. As the play already incorporates elements of gender swapping (Rosalind becoming Ganymede in the forest), it wasn't as strange as I had thought it would be and I actually quite enjoyed. The few lines Rosalind had which were like "if I were a man..." were made more funny by this element, I think.

While there were only 12 actors in the Globe Ensemble, there are twice as many parts as that! So some actors played 2 or even 3 parts throughout the play. My favourites were the Duke Senior/Duke Frederick/Sir Oliver Martext (Helen Schlesinger), who was very funny and had a great pretend horse throughout the play, Jaques (Pearce Quigley) who was dour and sarcastic, and Oliver/Duke Frederick's First Lord (Shubham Saraf) did really well and engaged with the audience in a really authentic way. I loved Celia (Nadia Nadarajah), who was not only a brilliant actress, but also deaf! She did all her lines by sign language, and Rosalind was often echoing elements which we may not have been able to understand otherwise. It was done in such a clever and authentic way and was really engaging to watch. Touchstone (Colin Hurley) the fool was a bit hard to understand, but I think he had one of the biggest roles in the show and definitely had a lot of lines to learn! That's really cool to watch him reel off line after line of crazy complicated Shakespeare lines without a flaw. Orlando (Bettrys Jones) was really engaging and believable, and her size (especially compared to Rosalind) made her even more funny! They made a really believable couple. But the best actor by quite a long shot was Rosalind (Jack Lackey), who managed to nail being a lady, being a lad in the forest, and even being a man acting as a lady pretending to be a lad in the forest! He was funny, engaging, believable... Just brilliant. And he looked a little like David Tennant!

While Shakespearean language can be complicated to understand at times, the way this was presented meant that even if I didn't get every word, I always got the gist behind the meaning. I guess that's the genius of Shakespeare.

And note to self, next time don't go to a standing matinee if you're sore all over. Aching for days...

Cultural Experiences: Old Bailey

Last week I went with my friend Jess to the Old Bailey. You can go into the public gallery and watch court trials in progress. It's an amazing experience which fascinated us both and we enjoyed it immensely.

We left our phones at a real estate agent down the road, headed to security and promptly got rejected for having other electronic devices (power banks, my fitness watch...) So we went back to add more things to the checked items, even our headphones!

The second time we got in, however we were told that because it was August it was relatively quiet. The first floor (there are 4 courts on each floor) there were no courts in session, so we went up to the next floor and sat in Court 8, where they were getting ready to start a trial. However, we had barely sat down when we had to stand up for the judge to leave as they had adjourned for about 40 minutes. We went outside and up another floor, where there were two courts in session, but the public galleries were full! We waited, but nobody was leaving so nobody could go in. We ended up back downstairs in Court 8 at 11am.

It was a trial of Gary Walker, who was accused of making threats to kill and assault by beating his stepfather. Essentially it seemed to be a tenancy dispute over who got to live in Walker's mother's house after her death. It was an interesting snapshot of the case - they swore in the jury, gave opening prosecution argument, had the first witness (the stepfather, who gave evidence from behind a curtain), cross examined, re examined, then sent the witness and jury away. At this point the defence barrister asked about prejudice, as the witness had said things that implied the defendant had been in jail before. He had, but that was still not to be mentioned as it was 10 years previous and not relevant. So they decided they couldnt get past that prejudice, then they called the jury back in and dismissed them! They warned the witness about what had happened and not to do it with the next jury. Then they stopped for the day around 2:30.

After that we went back upstairs, where we got into one of the two courts running (I think it was Court 12), where they were questioning the defendant in a murder case. Interestingly, he didn't seem to speak English, so he had an interpreter in the box with him. It looked hard for the barristers as they had to ask their complex questions in different ways and in multiple parts. The jury in this case had booklets with photos of evidence and locations which they kept referring to and which we were trying to see from up in the gallery! After a bunch of questions, the barrister said he was going to ask questions about written testimony, and they broke for the day at 4:20.

I don't know the results of the trials we watched, only that the first is finished and finished on Tuesday, and I believe that the second is still running.

Jess and I are going back next week, we enjoyed it so much. Such a great insight into the legal system for anyone interested... Just be warned, there is quite a lot of downtime. It is exciting, just kind of in slow motion. Well worth it though!