Starlight Express - Troubadour

I thought that about the track too - they navigate it easily, it's getting around the closest seating areas to the stage that seem to be more challenging.

Can confirm no moving seats - will wait for the first preview crowd to say more as technically more could have changed!

Does anybody else feel a really exciting buzz about this production? I don’t remember there being such excitement about a revival production (other than perhaps Sunset Boulevard but that was a very new take - this feels like there will still be an element of nostalgia attached to the original, especially given the set design.)

The only buzz I feel these days is the buzz when my phone goes off to tell me that you were not selected to win Lottery tix for Cabaret on 8 June 2024 at 19:30 BST .

It’s a good spectacle - great set, impressive lighting, and lovely to have a proper sound mix in this venue! Cast are all pretty solid - Rusty has a lovely voice. For me, it’s the races that are underwhelming. It’s all quite slow - I understand safety is probably a bigger thing for this than decades ago, but it means they don’t feel big.

Even though I saw it years ago, I don’t remember which songs were and weren’t in well enough, so will let others comment on that!

It’s fun though and I’m sure it will do well.

Show stop about 20 minutes in as someone tried to leave and fainted. The FOH person with them was totally confused about what to do and a few of us nearby had to shout stop to get people’s attention before cast and crew finally realised what was happening.

Lots of buzz around it for sure. My colleagues were all talking about it in the office last week and saying they plan to take their families to see it in the summer. Advertising for it has been pretty good too. I even saw 2 buses in Guildford today with the Starlight branding on the sides, so it’s not just London.
The issue I think they’ll have is that a lot of people are nostalgic for the original version, which this is not. I wish they’d used John Napier to design a new set - this one by Hatley looks ok, but it’s not on the same level as any of Napier’s Starlight sets. The success will depend on whether people take to this new version or not. Is there enough of the original left? We shall see. I’m there on Thursday, and again on the 22nd.

I think everyone has to get over this obsession with the original production.

You want to see that so much- go to Bochum.

This is a new version.

I know it's a new version, hence I've booked tickets and I'm excited BUT I will say one thing................the "new" rapping Rum Tum Tugger in Cats when it came back to The Palladium a few years back. Sometimes changes are not positive.

MJT has done a pretty good breakdown of what to expect:

So an intriguing evening no doubt.

Not really sure now what I expected but it was quite different really. I think. Still collecting my thoughts.

Multiple spoilers follow.

Music wise it's basically the 30th version minus Right Place Right Time which has been cut. I Am Me has an added section in middle from Tyre Tracks And Broken Hearts from Whistle Down The Wind (we were born going faster than the limits allow) which I rather liked but was completely random. And there is a new theme for the Hydra character which is listed in the programme as a song but is basically a repeating 3 lines (it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when, for hy-dro-gen). Again I rather liked it but calling it a song is pushing it! Otherwise the 30th version musically with a few tweaks. Lyrically and book wise there are considerably more changes.

The orchestrations were fantastic (very electronic), the sound system was brilliant and it sounded glorious. The cast all have fantastic voices and you'd have no idea was a first preview.

Character wise the nationals have gone and are now "coloured" engines - Green Arrow, Orange Flash etc. It's a bit like an episode of Gladiators. The entire freight ensemble have changed and are now Hydra, Porter, Lumber and Slick. Slick is vaguely the villain that was CB. Hydra turns up as per Dustin but is cool and completely different character wise. He transforms Rusty's steam from coal to hydrogen power after the Sequence.

Control is on stage most of the time (not on skates) which if you like kids on stage is fine. I don't massively so could have lived without it (though the girl playing her did a fantastic job).

Greaseball is now female which worked fine for me (in the context of the new production it works). It sort of makes the relationship with Dinah gay to the extent that you think trains in a child's dream have a sexuality. Again I rather like this! More representation is never bad.

The costumes were all a bit Six/WWRY/Saucy Jack/Return To Forbidden Planet/Sci-Fi influenced. Didn't love them. They might grow on me!

The set is nice but it's strangely small in there - feels a bit like the Gillian Lynne size wise. It's a good set but as expected nowhere near the scale of the Napier one.

The lighting was lovely.

But, I dunno, for me there was something missing. It was very cute. Almost Disney like really. And it looked very pretty. I wasn't wowed! I kinda thought there would be epic massive light/video/projections that would really knock you off your feet and compared to what can be achieved in 2024 it wasn't quite that. I was expecting (based on a guess and zero evidence) Eurovision style staging!

Of course I can't give an objective opinion being such a devotee of the original so all the above to be taken with a pinch of salt! But compared to the previous versions, it just felt slightly underpowered.

Otherwise it was very very slick and you'd have no idea was a first preview. The young cast were all absolutely faultless.

I do think kids and a younger new audience who don't know the original will love it and I think it will do incredibly well (which going back to my previous posts on that topic is of course a very good thing). I wonder if there will be much moaning from those expecting the original.

I really hope it will grow on me in time.

4 stars from me for now. (I was hoping for 5+). A great show. But it didn't floor me the way the first preview of Lloyd's Sunset did.

That person who collapsed was just behind me and collapsed on the stairs, next to the track it was me who shouted out “stop the show”. Which they duly did.

I agree the show racing was pedestrian and thought they were going to stop to help an old lady across the track, it seems all H&S. As for the show I thought it missed that ‘WOW’ moment, which was there when I first saw Starlight 33 years ago, I may have become show hardened, as since then I’ve seen hundreds of show since,  it could be possible if I was that 17 year old again stepping foot in the Wembley Park Theatre for one of my first shows, I may have been blown away. Saying that I thought the use of lasers were great, liked the planets, enjoyed the scooter riders - but ultimately I was unmoved And nothing that reminded me of the zeitgeist of the original.

My favourite song ‘He Whistled At Me’ seems to have evolved since the original? The titular song is brilliant, but when sung by Rusty tonight, I was underwhelmed, as the song requires a person, in the range of a tenor, who can give the song some powe - enjoyed the reprise more. 14 members of the cast tonight made there professional debut, which maybe altogether ALW seeing pound signs over quality.

The shows DNA has changed so much it is impossible to tell what are the original songs and what has been subsequently added, what I do know is that I need not a ‘megamix’.

The young girl playing control was excellent.

4 Stars. It is a great show, let down by a good production.

Good thing I weren't there cus I would've been making the Bad Behaviour thread by yelling "GO ON, ANDY!" at the top of my lungs