Just For One Day - Old Vic / Shaftesbury

The votes here are fascinating and making me even more excited to see this next month.

*raising a hand* present!
I vote 5 stars only when I am swept away with emotion so much that I don’t even notice the little imperfections or a couple of lines I would have changed. It’s completely irrational, you see.

Will be interesting to see the reviews on this show after press night, but it's starting to ignite. I was at a concert last night and chatting to a couple of people who had "heard good things" about this show. Sales are good. It might just be one of those shows that is good enough for people to forgive some of the contrived scripting. I'm going again tonight as it is relatively easy for me to get to.

Very much looking forward to hearing Jack Shalloo's (Midge) fantastic "Vienna", Joel Montague's (Harvey) mindblowing "Pinball Wizard" and utterly moving "Against All Odds", Abiona Omonua's (Amara) sensational "Blowing In The Wind", Danielle Steers (Marsha) and Ashley Campbell's (Jim) rocking "Dancing In The Streets".

The anthems in this "We Are The World" / "We Are the Champions" / "Message In A Bottle" / "We Will Rock You" / "Summer of '69" take the roof off. So many great songs in this - those listed are not even 1/3 of what gets covered. Has anybody seen the band Status Quo'ing their guitars in Olly Dobson's lively "Rockin' All Over The World"?

What would I change after my second viewing on Tuesday? The big reveal of the band had been stripped out - they were visible from the outset, whereas on opening preview a panel lifted up to show them on stage (which I felt was a nice touch, as when it started I felt disappointed that the musicians were going to be out of sight). I liked this moment as it added to the sense of occasion/concert feel. I think Maggie T's scenes need a couple more props to indicate No.10 (a big black door perhaps) as the background screen dominates and the headlines are a little distracting. For some reason, I'd like to see "Mrs T/Mr G" done on a platform or in a "Two Tribes" style boxing ring with an "Eye of the Tiger" guitar intro before they go into the rap sequence.

Some songs don't land well (probably because it is just snippets shoe-horned in - particularly "Everytime You Go Away" and "True". "All You Need Is Love" is sweetly sung by Jason Battersby but underplayed - it worked with Elvis Costello because he is charismatic and had 70,000 willing backing singers. I think the intention is for the audience to join in (like they did in the stadium) but it ends up falling a little flat. Also, Freddie Love (Skye) was used much more in the first preview and seemed to suffer from some of the cuts. This is a shame because they had a magnetic presence and sass, very much in the vein of Freddie Mercury (they also sang a couple of Queen tracks).

It's interesting watching this show evolve.

I don’t think there is anything that would get me back to this. As I said it made it angry - almost Liam Neeson angry. I just can’t look past how bad the book was; posters earlier in the thread likened it to a GCSE project. I entirely agree. I love so many of the songs, but as always with these concert style jukebox musicals (Rock of Ages, for instance) I’d rather stay home and watch YouTube videos of the original artists. I’ve never been one for tribute bands and cover artists, so I had similar issues with numerous other biographic musicals like Beautiful.

The ones which have I personally have enjoyed such as Piaf, Over the Rainbow or Jersey Boys either lean heavily into the drama of the piece or provide wit and humour in the writing to support the excellent music.

I can honestly say, hand on heart, that whilst this is nowhere near the objective “worst” show I’ve seen - the performances are competent enough and obviously the songs are superb - I can’t recall ever genuinely hating or getting angry about what I was watching.

The only thing I can think of which comes close is the Phantom remake, but even then the core show is still good, just less than we had before. I really didn’t enjoy but gave it 2* for the production, not the piece.

Fair enough for those who love this and can look past its faults (I note even the biggest fans of this seem to recognise issues with the book and the narrative style) but if I wanted an angry lecture I’d go to my Grandparents house and bring up politics.

I really don't want to argue with you.  One can award five stars for many reasons. I'm not looking for perfection.   It's the same reason I believe in 6 and 7 star hotels.  I'm perhaps looking at how this show made me feel, which is personal to each of us. 

There are quite a few people on this forum who gave it five stars, so why not step back from trying to be smart about my own particular reasons.  Feels like I'm living in your head rent-free, which I never asked to do.  Focus on what brings you joy, instead of nitpicking over the minutiae of other people's opinions.  You'll be happier for it, I promise.  

Thank you. Yes it was. Shame it was misunderstood ;(


 

Sorry. No. They haven’t. 

Sorry to report this is a comfortable 1 star for me, in spite of mostly wonderful performances from those in it. It was very popular in the room however, so I imagine this will go on to have another life after this OV run in one way or another.

For me, the book was a mess. I don't understand what the story they wanted to tell here was - is it the story of how Bob Geldof set-up Live Aid (or Band Aid, for that matter, since that takes up just as much of the show), or is it the story of the people around Live Aid? The show doesn't seem to want to decide that, and the result is something paced awfully, leaping to and fro with weak characters and far too many of them. The character introductions was an awful section, went on way too long, and introduced a number of totally irrelevant individuals. Also didn't understand why you would introduce "Bob", "Midge", or "Margaret" with first name only as if it was some sort of sly nose tap. The show was filled with moments of brutal, formulaic cliche which had me grimacing to my partner. The moral grandstanding just does not work, it is too precisely on the nose while also managing to not *actually* state a stance on any current issues, something underlined by how awkward the Thatcher segments were in an attempt to appeal to those on either side of the aisle and alienate neither.

Also thought the staging was phenomenally underwhelming - camera usage is definitely jumping the shark, and this is the worst case yet. The cameras (located in the boxes?) are totally unnecessary and allow any conventional setting or staging to be shunned in favour of a giant screen with some lame graphics, and occasional props. The Live Aid guitar prop was effective, but totally underused.

It's a show I considered leaving halfway, and one I wish I had. I imagine this will be largely mauled by critics regardless of the life it goes on to lead afterwards. If it's a good moneymaker for the Old Vic and keeps them able to do more interesting work for years to come, then I guess I can swallow the bitter pill of them putting their names to this out of character flop.

I hated the show, but I slightly disagree here.  A man next to me noisily ate a bag of crisps (and got shushed by others near the start), then tried to sort-of-quietly eat a chocolate bar, then brought a drink out (reasonable actually). By the middle of Act2 he started singing some lines by being slightly ahead of what was to come. I couldn't be bothered to tut or stop him - the show is fundamentally confused in its tone and format, so why spoil his enjoyment of what he perceived it to be, when I already loathed it? The script is awful, I found the use of three black performers/characters extremely questionable. They should have junked the script, played to its one strength - the underused but clever mash-ups** - and presented it as a stand-up-if-you-want-to gig at the Eventim Apollo. It doesn't make sense for the show to harp on about a rock'n'roll maverick who only got results by breaking the rules, and then expect the audience to sit tidily in well behaved rows. But they went and put a school play in between the songs, which does suggest a sit-down theatre experience - where you'd expect to get the different audience behaviour you talk of.

** Excellent job by Matthew Brind on these, he's the sole creative who could have raised this higher. Imagine music only, plus archive, plus verbatim memories, woven with the songs put in dialogue with eachother.  Could have been good.