Theatre Trip: ENO (The Cunning Little Vixen)

THE CUNNING LITTLE VIXEN (ENO)

Coliseum Theatre

Date: 26 February (Saturday), 7:30pm

Seats: Upper Circle, Row J, 34-36

(Seen with Jess and Bri!)

This show was quite a random seeming booking. I get emails from the ENO with upcoming shows, and the idea of one composed by Janacek was intriguing. Plus we  could get tickets for £25! So we did that.

We met up for dinner beforehand, having pasta at a place in Carnaby Street. We arrived at the theatre around 7:10, which would usually be enough time. We had booked seats in the Balcony, but it was closed this evening so we got moved down to the Upper Circle. We had to line up for the new tickets (which I did while the girls went to get programs etc) and they gave me 3 new tickets. But when we got up to the seats I discovered that actually they had given us 2 seats together, and the third in a totally different row! So at 7:20 I gave them to the girls to exchange while I sorted myself out before the show actually started. Luckily we got back to the right place just in time to take our new new seats in Row J, and actually all got to sit together!

I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't this. The music was composed in the 1920s, which actually I recognised once we got into it, as it had simliarities to Rachmaninov, Stravinsky and Shostakovich. It was in English, which I wasn't expecting as Janacek is actually Czech, and in English it had some very communist-sounding ideas (as noticed by Bri).

The costuming was really interesting and beautiful. They brought the woodland creatures to life and used both child and adult actors to portray the passing of time really well. They also had one scrolling backdrop which shows the passage of times really well and I liked that it was the main set piece. The rest of the set was very minimal and the costumes  did most of the talking. I think my favourites were the mushrooms, all in cream while wearing mushroom hats!

The performances were all great. I recognised a few names from seeing other performances, mostly Gilbert and Sullivan shows. Unfortunately I couldn't recognise any faces with such complex costumes! But every performance was great.

The plot was really interesting. I did need to read some of the plotline to get the details, but the little vixen being caught was practically visceral and I really liked the cyclical nature of it. It also had 3 acts, which I wasn't expecting, with interval after Act 2 and a very short Act 3. We did make the mistake of getting drinks at interval which we then had to drink quite quickly before it was all over!

I like visiting the ENO a lot and I saw that there is an opera of the Handmaid's Tale in April that I would like to go and see next. But there will probably be more musicals in the meantime...

Theatre Trip: Bring It On

 BRING IT ON

Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre

Date: 30 December (Thursday), 2:30pm

Seats: Stalls, Row FF, 5-6

(Seen with Jess!)

London has been a little bit crazy! Most everyone seems to have Covid, and it has really been affecting the west End shows. Many cast members have been out due to getting sick, and self-isolation requirements for close contacts mean that there have been 3rd covers playing roles for the first time. Great for the understudies and cover actors, but not so great for other shows when they have to get cancelled.

This show (Bring It On) was actually also cancelled in the lead up to Christmas, but luckily everyone was back in for this show. It was only a few shows after the Christmas break, after all. Jess and I decided to catch a matinee over our Christmas break.

We didn't know much about this musical. I have seen the movie it is based on, and Lin-Manuel Miranda worked on the music and lyrics - plus I didn't realise until the program that Jeff Whitty (of Avenue Q fame) wrote the book! So it has pedigree.

We actually almost ran late, as the tickets on the TodayTix app only had 'Southbank Centre' down as the theatre, so we headed for the main building. We popped to the bathroom beforehand and got to the theatre at 2.15, only to find out it was the wrong theatre and we needed to go to the Queen Elizabeth Hall in a different building! Luckily it was right next door so we still made it in time.

Unfortunately, the show itself wasn't a stand out. The music was fine - it wasn't particularly memorable (I couldn't sing you any songs from it) but you could tell Lin had a hand in it (particularly when someone started rapping!) The dance and cheer parts were definitely the highlight. The performers were amazing dancers and they were doing actual cheer, basket tosses and the like, right there on stage, which was very cool!

Some of the performers were great. I really liked the girl who played Eva (Campbell's nemesis - played by Alicia Belgarde), she was a little powerhouse when it came to singing and dancing! Bridget (Chelsea Hall) was also amazing, and unexpected because she seemed like she shouldn't have been very good. So great. I did feel like some of the actors might have been a bit poorly or off-colour though, as some weren't great. I think that some of them were on their first job as well, which might be a factor.

All in all, it was good. I am glad that we saw it, but I would rather go and see something else again instead. But I'm always glad to see something new!

Theatre Trip: &Juliet (2)

 &JULIET

Shaftesbury Theatre

Date: 16 December (Thursday), 7:30pm

Seats: Stalls, Row B, 20-23

(Seen with Lisa and Louise from work!)

Understudies: Anne Hathaway (Kirstie Skivington), Lance de Bois (Ivan De Freitas), Francois de Bois (Billy Nevers)

We had booked this one a few months in advance. I had seen online that you could book the front row seats for the very reasonable price of £35. After seeing this the first time I realised that Louise, a colleague from work, would really love it, so I texted and suggested we see it together! After I mentioned it to Lisa she was in as well so I booked for the 3 of us in the front row for a few months later! It was actually good timing as Lou left us at the end of this term so it became a bit of a celebration for her.

We finished work around half 4 and headed straight in to Tottenham Court Rd station. Nearby was a Shake Shack, so we ate and chatted while we waited for the show to be ready to start. Then of course programs and getting to our seats.

And sitting in the front row was amazing! Even though we had 3 understudies it was such a cool party experience - and there were empty seats in the theatre (and also they had closed the grand circle and moved people down a floor) but everyone was really into it!

We had such a great cast - Kirstie Skivington was on again for Anne Hathaway, who we saw last time. I was disappointed I haven't had the chance to see Cassidy Janson yet (she is injured at the moment according to her Instagram), but Kirstie Skivington is amazing in the role and I love her portrayal. I just wish that I could get the chance to see Cassidy and compare it. We also had Ivan de Freitas in the role of Lance. He was great too - I do wish a little he was David Bedella as his portrayal is everything, but my friends said he was just as good and they wouldn't have known he was an understudy. And Frankie - the understudy was incredible! I preferred his portrayal to Tim Mahendran, actually, he had this amazing growl moment in one song that had me like WOAH. Billy Nevers, you were incredible!

Of course most of the regular cast was still in - Miriam Teak-Lee was awesome as always and my colleagues particularly loved Mel la Barrie (I swear she gets funnier every time!), but for me the draw is always the boys. Jordan Luke Gage was absolutely awesome as Romeo as he was the first time. But Oliver Thompsett is always the biggest draw of this show for me and it was an utter delight to get to see his facial expressions and reactions up close!

I had a couple of 'moments' during the show with cast members too. One of the perks of being on the front row! On Ollie's entrance, I may have made a rather loud noise which had him look and smile directly at me! It was a lovely moment. And at the end, Lisa pulled me up and we danced at the front, and at one point Kirstie looked over to us and did a little boogie at us, which was also awesome.

Such an amazing night, and I was really glad to introduce this show to my colleagues - they have both decided that they need to take their families to the show now! I can't wait to go see it again soon.

Theatre Trip: Hamilton (FINALLY!)

HAMILTON

Victoria Palace Theatre

Date: 14 December (Tuesday), 7:30pm

Seats: Stalls, Row C, 30-31

(Seen with Richard!)

Understudies: Alexander Hamilton (Alternate - Nuno Queimado), Aaron Burr (Jay Perry), King George (Aaron Lee Lambert)

This show we had been waiting SO LONG to see! Booking tickets to Hamilton was my 30th birthday present (which was in January 2020), and we booked for 6 months later to make sure we could get amazing seats. However, 2020 (and 2021) had other plans and our show was postponed a year, then again 6 months as the new date was one week before the theatres reopened properly! So it took almost 2 years, as I now turn 32 in just a few weeks. It was totally worth the wait though!

Richard and I got some sushi from Itsu for dinner and ate it outside the theatre before we went in. We had plenty of time and even though the queue looked long it was pretty quick to get in. Our seats were amazing! We were close enough we could see absolutely everything and with lots of detail but far enough back that we could see the whole stage in one go. The set doesn't move very much with helped too. We had a few understudies as well due to Covid sickness.

I thought the show was amazing. I knew the music well but I hadn't seen the Disney+ version so I didn't know anything about the staging or choreography and I thought it was amazing! Really dynamic and musical, and the ensemble was really amazing. They had a lot to do and did it all in their costumes, which I thought were really clever. They wore their base layers (which were vaguely period) and continued to add and remove additional layers depending on who they were in any number.

There were a few cast members who I thought really stood out. Angelica Schuyler (Ava Brennan) was fab, and every time I saw her I wanted to see her more. We did think that Hamilton (Nuno Queimado) was VERY good and that he got stronger throughout the performance. I also really liked Jefferson in Act 2 (Waylon Jacobs), he was an excellent balance of funny and witty and had a really excellent suit! I also loved King George (Aaron Lee Lambert) - he had everyone in hysterics with just his mannerisms.

It was also much funnier than I thought. This sounds obvious, but you can't see facial expressions on a cast recording. Some of the more deadpan lines were much, much funnier when you could see the visual gags that went along with it!

I am so grateful we finally got to see it! I am really looking forward to returning to see some other performers in the roles, particularly of Hamilton and Burr. It also turned out we had great timing - as due to more extended absences, Hamilton has been closed for almost every show since (I'm writing this almost a week afterwards, with shows not going ahead for Wednesday, Thursday (2), Friday, Saturday (2) or Sunday!) so really we should consider ourselves lucky that we go to see it at all. I am very grateful and will be returning when things settle down again.

Theatre Trip: Tim Minchin - Back Again Tour

Eventim Apollo

Date: 9 November (Tuesday), 7:30pm
Seats: Block 7, Row E 66-67 

(Seen with Richard!)

Even though it was a Tuesday night and we were already quiet tired (and with Richard due to fly to Spain early the next morning as well), but we had even more tickets booked! Tonight was a very exciting one, as we had been waiting a while for it. We had tickets to see Tim Minchin. Now he is probably best known for being the composer of both the Matilda and Groundhog Day musicals, but he has been a musical comedian for more than 15 years! He is an Aussie with a fab strong accent and a really irreverent and smart style.

We headed over to Hammersmith for this concert, to a new-to-us venue, the Eventim Apollo. It's very big but we were happy with our upstairs seats and a decent view. It did start a little late, I think they had people still coming in for a while after 7.30 so we didn't start until almost 7.50! This tour is just called Back (Again), but has the fun subline 'Old Songs, New Songs, F**k You Songs', so we knew we were going to get some fun songs we already knew!

He opened the concert alone at the piano with one of the songs from the new album, 'If This Plane Goes Down'. It was a more somber way to start the show but I liked it. In between each number Tim spoke a bit, a lot about what his life has been so far and his experiences and they were all really good interludes! I love his absurdist  but realist sense of humour and I feel as Aussies (and to a lesser extent, Brits) we really get his style.

After the first number he launched into one of my favourite really old songs, F Sharp. It's very musically clever and I enjoy the dissonance of it! I really love overall how Tim Minchin doesn't ever talk down to his audience, that every piece of humour is smart, even when it's crude or includes swearing (and in some other songs of his there is A LOT of swearing!). Tim even had us singing along with the F# at the end while he is playing in F, and of course Richard and I nailed it!

Then he included one of his beat poems - his first. Before it again he introduced a concept which came up a few times in the show: the 'Glossary of Terms'. This was partly to make sure everyone knew what he was on about, but also partly to point out how old we are and that THERE ARE ADULTS AT THAT SHOW WHO WERE BORN AFTER THE YEAR 2000. Crazy, right?! After the relevant terms, we heard Mitsubishi Colt. I really like that one, and Tim pointed out that it is also interesting because the backing to the beat poem is improvised every night. It was very cool!

Then he performed another of my old favourites - Thank You God. After that it was back to a new song 'Airport Piano' - and partway through the song, the curtains fell back to reveal the amazing band back there on stage! There was even a 3 person brass section! They were used really well throughout, I felt. They finished Airport Piano together, then followed it up with 15 Minutes and The Absence of You from the same album. Topping off the first half was another classic, If I Didn't Have You. It was an older song but in a completely reworked form, Latinising the song and giving it a super groovy vibe which had me grooving in my seat.

After interval we were back for just a few more songs. Starting with Leaving LA, which was accompanied by the projection of the video clip on the big screen (I liked it's stop motion vibe a lot!). And then he performed possibly my favourite Minchin song. He spelled out... C...H...E...E...S...E...! CHEESE! He even put in a break for a monologue right before the cheese puns, where he theorised that this might be one of the greatest songs ever written... Or complete crap. I'm going with genius though.

He finished up the second half with I'll Take Lonely Tonight and Talked Too Much, Stayed Too Long (which sounds like me to be honest!) We gave him a huge standing ovation, and after a minute he came back out for Carry You, a final song from his newest album.

It was such a fun evening. I laughed until I cried, enjoyed the new songs very much and absolutely loved seeing the old ones live. I wish that I could have seen it more than once!

Theatre Trip: Heathers

HEATHERS

New Wimbledon Theatre
Date: 5 November (Friday), 7:30pm
Seats: Stalls W10-12

(Seen with Jess and Linda!)

It's another touring show at Wimbledon! These are my favourite on a work day, because no matter when I say I'm going leave (5pm) versus when I actually leave (just after 5:30!), I can still have time for dinner and a quick catch up before a show. Today Jess and I met at McDonalds at half 6 to grab some dinner before the show. I also had her birthday present to give to her, as I haven't seen her since her birthday last week! Linda ran late and had to sneak in after the opening number, but it was lovely to have her.

As it is Heathers, I have seen it before on the West End several times. This production was essentially the same in plot and staging as on the West End. It has, however, been several years since we saw it and of course the cast has completely changed. We also had several understudies in our performance.

We even got drinks at the interval - it has been a long week after all! Being Heathers, they have slushies for sale, and I got us each one with an added shot of vodka for interval! Unfortunately, my drink was so frozen that it got stuck in the straw and I couldn't actually drink it until it melted, which meant I didn't get it to actually drink until after the show!

I thought the Heathers in this show were quite good. Heather Chandler, Duke and MacNamara were played by U/S Daisy Twells, Merryl Ansah, and Lizzy Parker respectively. Heather Chandler was much funnier than I remember Jodie Sam Steele was, but her vocals weren't quite as strong, especially up in the higher register. Heather Duke, I actually preferred to T'Shan Williams from the West End cast. Her vocals were stronger and she didn't fade into the  background as much in this version, which I liked. Heather Mac I also really liked. She had a very different, less silly portrayal than Sophie Isaacs in the other cast and I liked her vocals a lot. 

Ram and Kurt (U/s Callum Connolly, Liam Doyle) I didn't like as much. They were good jocks, of course, but I didn't think they were actually handsome enough! If you're going to spend more than an hour every night wearing just your underpants you need to be looking good. JD (Simon Gordon) was quite good - a little shouty at times but good. He didn't really get as creepy as I expected, either, until the key moments when his psychopath side actually came out.

Veronica (U/S May Tether) I really liked. Her comedic timing and facial expressions were totally on point! I thought it made her much funnier. Her accent was VERY strong and meant a lot of the vowels changed shape (and therefore sound) and it made some of them a lot harsher, but her notes were very accurate and I felt like she balanced the character of Veronica really well. I have to admit I was more impressed than I would have been given that she is the understudy rather than the usual Veronica. Unusual to have an understudy on a Friday night, but oh well.

In summary, it was a very good show and I loved being able to see a show I really like again! It's just that the original West End cast was the only cast of this show most people have experienced, and being on the recording too means that their versions of the characters feel like they are set in stone for me. So they weren't bad, just very different versions. And I did still like them a lot! It's nice to see different versions of familiar characters.

Theatre Trip: HMS Pinafore

 H.M.S. PINAFORE

Coliseum Theatre
Date: 30 October (Saturday), 7:30pm
Seats: Upper Circle A 21-22

(Seen with Richard!)

We were excited to come back to the Coliseum for another ENO performance! We decided that rather than rushing a takeaway dinner after our old favourite Mod Pizza has shut up shop in the UK due to the pandemic, we'd head to one of the many pubs near the Coliseum and eat there. Looking at the pubs there was one serving Thai food which we wanted to try but by the time we got there it was full! It was half 6 at that point so we popped into a nice looking Thai place just a few doors down.

By 7 we had ordered, received and finished our entrees and we were waiting for our mains. But unfortunately it got to 7:15 and we still didn't have our food. By this time I was stressing, so I went to the bathroom in the restaurant, but I got back and we still didn't have any food! By that time Richard had asked for it to go instead, so at 7:25 we were literally running out the door of the restaurant with our food all boxed up (they did give us the noodles for free for the trouble, which was nice) the one minute to the theatre.

We arrived, had to run down to the cloakroom (of course we couldn't take our food to our seats!) which had already closed, so find someone who could open it for us, check our food, then run up 2 flights of steps to our seats. Luckily we actually made it just while the orchestra was tuning up!

This performance was quite fun. As with other G&S performances we have seen, I knew the show well because of the version with Jon English in Australia in the 90s. This is definitely one of the more comedic operettas and I really enjoy the twisting of the plot in this particular show. They definitely added some things in an attempt to make the show even more funny, although we did feel a bit like some made them feel more like a panto - and not always in a good way. The addition of the Midshipmite was a good call, but they also added a silly Boris Johnson gag, a repeating seagull joke which was quite silly, and the worst one - one of the aunts who never lifted her head, walked with a cane (like a old person stereotype) and kept walking across the show or into parts of the stage. The rest of the audience seemed to think it was funnier than we did, so maybe it is funnier if you're British?

The main casting draw for UK people is Les Dennis, who is a famous comedian and was playing the role of Sir Joseph. He was fine, although it was clear he was not a singer. I much preferred the ENO cast proper though. There were a pair of Harewood Artists in the cast. This means that they have a special programme of training to boost and support their new careers. In this case, both Ralph Rackstraw (Elgan Llyr Thomas) and Josephine (Alexandra Oomens) were these artists and I was very impressed with them vocally. Particularly Josephine - I thought that she had a gorgeous voice and surprisingly good comic timing!

The 2 best performances were definitely Captain Corcoran and the Midshipmite (a new character created for this version to be the cabin boy, and played by a child). Rufus Bateman was the Midshipmite at this performance and he was appropriately cheeky and I felt like he added quite a lot to the performance. Turns out he also is a killer tap dancer! So was the Captain, played by John Savournin to a tee. He was serious when he needed to be and silly when needed too. They added some tap dancing into the show which I thought was very well placed.

Despite the drama getting in (and the fact we had to eat out dinner after the show when we got home!), it was a very enjoyable evening. After lots of modern musicals, I do enjoy an operetta to get back to my childhood, it feels like.