Kiss Me Kate - Barbican / Cinema Release

How is Brush up Your Shakespeare? That's always been my favourite song from Kiss Me, Kate

Poll added💋

Hammed being funny isn't surprising to me, he's brilliant in the BBC sitcom Black Ops.

I see the phantom 1 star vote has appeared as usual. We always get one or two of them for every show but the member seldom posts to say why they gave it that.

Brilliant - probably the highlight of Act Two for me, in retrospect. Nigel and Hammed are hilarious together!

Lol fine the phantom shall speak. New to this musical but had no issue with the antiquated themes within the context of the show (wasn't expecting nor wanting any updates to suit contemporary tastes) so that did not factor into my critique at all.

However... the design was mind-numbingly boring, a 3-sectioned revolve and all of them the same brick walls. Sure backstage and the alley behind theatres aren't particularly beautiful but surely they could be made slightly different, as a little visual treat? 2 sections had a pointless balcony level as it was occupied by actors who did absolutely nothing of note on it. The dressing rooms set was split with a door in between, in a single scene you could have the leads using this door half the time and completely ignoring this imaginary wall the rest of the time- totally baffling. For the show-within-a-show scenery there was nothing particularly beautiful nor innovative- I wasn't expecting anything more but was still underwhelmed. Also kept wondering how long it'll be till someone falls into the pit.

Lighting was fun and snappy but got predictable after the first couple scenes. Unsure if it was some off timing at first preview but the little 'preshow' that happened added nothing, the theatre doors did not close until a few minutes after the overture had started so the very top of the show felt and sounded very weak.

Cast wise SJB was hugely disappointing vocally, Adrian shockingly weak, Georgina and Charlie great and criminally underused. Don't think it was a sound mix issue leading me to such conclusions since Georgina sounded fantastic and was unequivocally brilliant in 'Always True to You in My Fashion'. The gangster duo did have great comedic timing and 'Brush up Your Shakespeare' was funny, but not for what felt like 20 reprises at that pacing.

The book wasn't compelling at all (nor was the music), brushed over many plot points but the show still dragged!

This does not hold a candle to the other recent Bartlett Sher/Michael Yeargan/Catherine Zuber collaboration involving an (actually clever) revolve, the Lincoln Center MFL, which I greatly enjoyed despite its faults.

Did we watch different shows? She's singing up a storm! 😂

Well thanks for coming forward and identifying yourself. I have no issue with people not liking something, afterall that's what this forum is all about and hearing a broad spectrum of views.
It's just that, in the past, we have had people give 1 star and everyone else gives it 4 or 5 but then they don't post anything to explain why they didn't enjoy something.
I'm going on Friday so will report back.

Tuesday 18th June

Two stars from me - one for SJB and one for the comedy duo. The rest of the time I was quite bored. Like a poster above, I thought the set was dull and only really justified its scale (and cost presumably) once or twice. The show within a show was ugly in terms of set and costume. The casting of Dunbar is rather baffling considering the wide array of leading men available. Appreciate it was a preview and no doubt will tighten up but this dragged on for what felt like hours. What a disappointing evening.