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Post by orchidman on Jul 22, 2018 23:08:50 GMT
If you like the music, this is worth seeing because the band is excellent, but otherwise it's ropey.
Tommy Steele is impressive for his age but it makes very little sense for him to play Glenn Miller and he barely bothers keeping up an American accent. Would think he should compère and someone else play the lead.
The book is particularly weak even for this sort of show.
And yet the band is great and they play Sing, Sing, Sing twice (even though that's a Benny Goodman arrangement?) so there's that.
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Post by orchidman on Jul 16, 2018 22:53:34 GMT
Nowhere near as clever as it thinks it is. Didn't really see the point of performing a version of the old play, didn't think it had anything new to say on the serious topics, and the projection near the end shocked the audience but was entirely unearned.
A lively production and I was never bored to be fair, but don't believe the hype.
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Post by orchidman on Jul 15, 2018 21:47:57 GMT
You can't give handball for that, it's an absolute mockery. People have hands and the ball will strike them in the box from time to time. But it's not the fault of VAR, the ref just made a stupid call.
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Post by orchidman on Jul 13, 2018 23:43:59 GMT
Agree with the general tenor of the comments. I just don't think the play itself is much cop, some great directorial stuff in the first ten minutes but the time jumping is brainless given how different a woman's options were in the 1920s to today, which is pretty fundamental given what happens. And as has been said, hard to feel too much sympathy for a lead character who is so lacking in character.
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Post by orchidman on Jun 28, 2018 13:53:02 GMT
"To get to 25, we eventually realized that we could only include one play by any given playwright, or risk being overrun by a medley of Annie Bakers or Suzan-Lori Parkses.
Conversely, we decided that we could not include veteran playwrights just because they wrote great plays before 1993."
Huh? With Albee on there?
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Post by orchidman on Jun 23, 2018 1:45:37 GMT
Incredibly mediocre, how this made it to the West End is the biggest question it provokes.
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Post by orchidman on Jun 15, 2018 1:22:51 GMT
True West is also going to be playing on Broadway around the same time, has that ever happened with two different productions of the same play? The Glass Menagerie, only last year.
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Post by orchidman on Jun 13, 2018 0:59:56 GMT
^^^
Your best bet would be to download the Today Tix app and get some of the £20 rush tickets that go on sale on the day at 10am, which when I bought were prime stalls seats (otherwise £67.50). Looking at the seating plan, there is no way that performance will sell out.
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Post by orchidman on Jun 4, 2018 17:56:35 GMT
I would definitely have had The Nether. Can't be having Mr. Burns at all. This is Our Youth is my favourite from the list, surprised we haven't seen a London production of The Humans yet, I'm sure it would play.
J.T. Rogers can probably feel aggrieved not to have Oslo on there, and Joshua Harmon too, I would go for Admissions over Bad Jews.
Good People was a very very solid play, and for pure entertainment, Fish in the Dark was an excellent comedy.
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Post by orchidman on Jun 2, 2018 18:03:24 GMT
The writing just isn't good enough to pull off the concept or the disparate plotlines. Couldn't help wondering what insight a young-ish American playwright has into the Russian psyche and history. Most of the themes were done so much better in 1984.
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Post by orchidman on Apr 26, 2018 3:57:04 GMT
The play very much felt like let's throw a load of stuff at a wall and see what sticks. Some of it painfully bad like the karaoke (not least because there was never a WWTBAM music round), some of the court stuff excellent. Would have liked a proper examination of the evidence which I don't feel we got, but the audience seemed to like the naff showbiz stuff so what can you do.
I thought it was a big omission that there was never the distinction made between whether you thought them guilty of cheating or not, and whether if yes you thought that a crime. It was alluded to by the guy in the anachronistic Chelsea scarf (that wasn't their badge until 2005, how often plays gets sporting details wrong) but never expanded on as a serious point.
Couldn't help but think how rare it is to see a biographical play in which the main male and female leads are less good-looking than their real life counterparts.
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Post by orchidman on Apr 22, 2018 2:00:03 GMT
Saw it on Broadway with Kevin Kline and it was crap, so heaven help it with Rufus Hound in the lead.
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Post by orchidman on Feb 26, 2018 17:56:16 GMT
I liked Pan's Labyrinth but this didn't work at all for me, I think having the child's perspective in PL helped draw you in.
Limited psychological insight or development, all very inert, at times outright silly, the tone was all over the place, the subplots went nowhere, and the villain was cartoonish.
Three Billboards is flawed too but miles better.
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Post by orchidman on Feb 16, 2018 23:54:24 GMT
Just didn't think this worked. This central romance is faithful to the film and well played but the slapstick supporting stuff is from a different show, and I never thought the two successfully cohered.
I'm not convinced this was a good choice of film to stage in the first place, it's a small, intimate film, many of the best bits are subtle expressions from the actors in close-up.
A couple of nice stage effects but to little end.
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Post by orchidman on Feb 1, 2018 2:47:08 GMT
Given their recent run of form on new material, I have no problem with Follies coming back.
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Post by orchidman on Dec 3, 2017 21:39:19 GMT
I thought Act Two outstayed its welcome but I enjoyed it more than the Times and Telegraph reviewers. It's didactic and wouldn't play in a large theatre but in the atmospheric Finborough with a good set and lighting, and an elegant harp accompaniment, I thought it was quite charming. Alexander Knox excellent in the pivotal role.
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Post by orchidman on Nov 28, 2017 11:00:51 GMT
Front row £12 for tonight on the Delfont Mackintosh website. Wonder if they are putting those online now as day seats or if it's a one off.
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Post by orchidman on Nov 24, 2017 11:09:49 GMT
Had a look for The Birthday Party, Mary Stuart, The Ferryman and pretty confident better offers will crop up for all of those. Thinking about Long Day's Journey into Night but having seen it in Bristol I'm not that fussed.
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Post by orchidman on Nov 14, 2017 10:16:26 GMT
Very, very, very easy to book tickets at 10am in the public sale.
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Post by orchidman on Nov 12, 2017 11:38:56 GMT
Elvis Costello & The Attractions - (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding It's an Elvis Costello song, but I think it was the Nick Lowe cover they were playing. I can only echo the recent comments, a very enjoyable evening, and very clever the way things set up in the first half had their payoff in the second Not 100% sure I remember which version it was but I'm far too much of a music geek to not say that it's a Nick Lowe song made more famous by the Elvis Costello cover.
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Post by orchidman on Nov 12, 2017 3:18:00 GMT
The story was not believable. The unemployed male lead who dressed in grey and lived in a bedsit would never be in a relationship with a glamorous showgirl. Haven't seen this production but she's not really supposed to be a glamorous showgirl, she's supposed to be a feeble singer clinging to a job at a third-rate venue. And he's supposed to be a reasonably charismatic young writer, who is also American, which would be quite glamorous in Mitteleuropa at that time. Maybe this production got it wrong but I don't think Cabaret would be such a consistent hit if such a key element of the story itself was off.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 29, 2017 22:41:22 GMT
Bit of a long shot but does anyone know the name of the song that was played at the end, as in after the lights have gone up? It might be a different song each evening I suppose but it's been bugging me for a few days! Elvis Costello & The Attractions - (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love And Understanding
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Post by orchidman on Oct 22, 2017 3:09:14 GMT
Enjoyable enough - the first half is rather mediocre fare, second half quite a bit stronger. That's largely because I would say if you follow politics, particularly any discourse surrounding the Labour party, there is hardly a single insight or perspective you won't have heard before. This House being set so far in the past meant Graham was able to please with quality research alone, he struggles to add much to recent and better remembered history. On the political front, the Freeman character was supposedly a cabinet minister and yet we get basically nothing on that, it's almost difficult to imagine that these characters exist outside of these scenes in this room.
The second half is more about the personal relationships, and the material there is decent, elevated to something more by exceptional performances from Freeman and Greig. Whether the play works overall depends on whether you buy the ending, not sure I did, but by that stage the audience was very much on side and went with it.
Some of the comedy is a bit tired, a couple of the punchlines had me cringing but the cast sold it. It's the kind of play that works for what it is right now at this moment with this cast and will have most people leaving happy having been entertained, and yet it is hard to imagine it ever being worthy of a revival.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 21, 2017 1:19:34 GMT
It's a very slight play but the pair have some fun with it and you can't go wrong with the £15 row R stalls tickets.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 18, 2017 9:50:48 GMT
I would definitely see The Ferryman and you'll pick up really good value tickets for the Wednesday matinee on the Delfont Mackintosh site if you wait until, say, Monday for the last minute dynamic pricing to kick in. As someone posted on here, this week you could have had top stalls £35, decent dress circle £12.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 16, 2017 22:28:28 GMT
I don't particularly like musicals but I love Cabaret. A lot of the songs performed are diegetic, including the opening number, so it eases people in who don't like characters bursting out in song in normal life. And I would say the story and characters are very strong.
This is not a recommendation for the current touring production, albeit that I haven't seen it.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 13, 2017 2:36:39 GMT
My regretful conclusion is that there was never a play here in the first place. Yes, I think I would agree, and with your other points. There was possibly a glimpse in Act Two of it having some potential as a sort of glamorous version of 'The Father' but the execution came nowhere near, and even then coming so soon off that play being a hit, it would have been difficult to eclipse it. Lindsay gives a great effort but is nowhere aged enough (in reality or theatrically) to play 81.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 7, 2017 3:12:04 GMT
Really enjoyed it, easily one of the plays of the year, better than I was expecting because I thought the reviews likely to be over-generous. I think it's a better drama than Jerusalem, which had a brilliant lead role but not much else, although I'm not totally sold on the ending.
Seriously tempted to go back and see the replacement cast, which is not something I normally do.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 2, 2017 23:03:26 GMT
I have no idea why they would set it in the present day. The idea of someone Jack O'Connell's size being a college football star in the 1950s is far-fetched, totally laughable now.
The scene between Meaney and O'Connell was first rate but in general this is a very good play being performed just about adequately.
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Post by orchidman on Oct 2, 2017 22:33:51 GMT
A fairly entertaining show but nothing special. As people have said, Act Two doesn't really deliver a payoff to Act One, which had been reasonably promising.
The characters aren't wholly believable, can't possibly imagine the soap actress ever getting together with the younger brother, and the American girl's IQ seems to jump about 25 points during the interval. Having one actor play both brothers didn't really work but the cast was fine. I think three characters have the same tick of following the previous person's statement with a question like "Is that so?" or "Did you?" which I couldn't tell if was for some effect or just mediocre writing.
The writing in general felt like the competent end of second-rate, characters saying the things the playwright needed them to say (the soap actress suddenly having an informed opinion about the 1968 generation, the American girl suddenly knowing about patriarchy and who George Eliot was) rather than what they would actually have said. Some amusing lines, a good crescendo before the interval but no real depth to it.
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