Stranger Sings! - The Vaults & Tour

Ah I wish I'd heard about this sooner, all sold out now and I'd have loved to have seen it!

I think there's a good chance of this appearing at the Edinburgh Fringe this summer. It would fit well in one of the larger spaces at Underbelly, Pleasance, Assembly or Gilded Balloon. It has sellout Fringe hit written all over it.

This was very funny, and musically fun, as well.

Of course, as with "One Woman Show," the humour hinges on familiarity with the source material, so it's a blast if you've seen and liked Season 1 of "Stranger Things." After all, comic surprise requires a base level of knowledge for the surprise to be triggered. Otherwise, you're just nonplussed lol.

There are some terrifically talented comic actors in this, with Holly Sumpton, Anna Amelia, Jonty Peach and Howard Jenkins all exceptional.

Some spoilers follow. . .

There is somewhere in this a critique about sexism in the eighties, and about how that carries over into the portrayal of the older males and females in the show.

Namely, men are basically automatons, who have fixed expressions (god, Peach makes me laugh the way he does Steve Harrington's furrowed eyebrow cool and Jonathan Byer's perma-cringing fear, and Jenkins's Hopper's open-mouthed blankness is almost as funny), and women are overwrought emotional headcases:

Holly Sumpton's nervy cigarette smoking Joyce Byers outdoes Bette Davis for melodrama, her every breathy expression an assertion of her own hyper-importance. She's a terrific singer too, and her full on Gypsy inspired explosion of melodious emotionalism, followed by a demand for an Emmy (lol) brought the house down.

Anna Amelia's Nancy Wheeler is funny not only for her exaggerated emotionalism, but also for how shallow Amelia reveals it all to be, turning her emotions from one person to the other faster than you can catch a breath, in a way, as unhinged as Sumpton's Joyce Byers.

And Amelia's turn as Eleven is also a hoot, revealing that Eleven's traumatic upbringing has made her the perfect companion for Hopper, essentially as emotionally stunted as he is, with her v-eyebrowed, confused-yet-threatening-frowny-face a gem of comic exaggeration, making her request for him to be "her daddy," as she brushes off hapless Mike's advances, especially funny.

In one song, Georgia McElwee's Barb really shines as well.

As a companion piece to the show, this is a gem, and one hopes that the strong parody aspects keep this show safe from the sad fate of the less parodic, more copycat, Bridgerton musical.

4 and a half stars from me. Hopefully it will be back at some point. It deserves to be.

Touring from September.

Dates announced for Bath, Chatham, Cardiff and Stockport with more to follow.

www.strangersingsuk.com/buy-tickets

Stranger Sings will play at Southwark Playhouse Borough from 3 - 26 August. This is such fun for Stranger Things fans!

This looks like so much fun!


Tour Schedule:


Show Website

Tonight’s performance has been cancelled, was never meant to be for me anyhow!! Thankfully I hadn’t booked train tickets in for tonight!

Despite knowing this is a cult hit off Broadway, and reading the positive reviews for its London dates, I went to this curious as to what was in store but with pretty low expectations.

I definitely didn't anticipate much in way of a set, considering its tour stops are mostly only one or two nights. As the safety curtain went up at the Blackpool Grand Theatre though, the first pleasant surprise of the evening was to see that it was far from the fairly bare stage I'd been anticipating. There were even a few 'wow's from around the audience! That might be getting a bit carried away but the set did look good and contained a few hidden surprises.

From the opening number, about how nothing strange ever happens in Hawkins, I loved this show. You certainly have to be familiar with Stranger Things, there's little attempt to explain who characters are for anyone unfamiliar, but for fans of the series there's lots to enjoy here.

Plenty of laughs, a solid score, with a terrific multi-roling cast who, with costume and wig changes galore, bring the array of characters in Hawkins to life! Anna Amelie who plays Eleven, Nancy and Robin is the standout member of the company but all of the cast play their part in this parody remake, meticulously mirroring and emphasising their on-screen counterparts' unique mannerisms.

The action is focused on season one but there's a few knowing nods to later seasons and plenty of references to the Eighties and musicals more generally. Hearing the Inspector Gadget theme music during the interval was a bonus! That went some way to making up for the interval being a random 30 minutes long, not due to technical issues, that's just what it is for this show apparently.

As an affectionate send-up of, and zany homage to, Hawkins and The Upside Down, this is high-energy fun that's far better than it has any right to be! If you've always wanted to see a dancing demogorgon live on stage, then it's time to let the tendrils of Stranger Sings reel you in!

Snazzy new trailer!