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Post by stevej678 on Feb 25, 2016 19:57:41 GMT
Quite intrigued by this new musical by Dougal Irvine, inspired by The Beggar's Opera by John Gay, playing at the Park Theatre from 28th April - 4th June 2016. The casting certainly looks impressive, led by Lauren Samuels and George Maguire, with Natasha Cotriall, John McCrea, Maimuna Memon and Giovanna Ryan. A few of the songs are on Soundcloud, e.g. soundcloud.com/dougal-irvine/4-do-you-want-a-baby-baby. Anyone else going to give this a whirl? |
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Post by stageyninja83 on Feb 25, 2016 20:44:12 GMT
Yes I booked a while back as love some of Dougal's writing. Excited by the cast now too.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 26, 2016 9:41:03 GMT
I've booked too - really like the Park theatre, always nice to go there.
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Post by showgirl on Mar 1, 2016 19:19:14 GMT
Love the Park Theatre + have liked what I've heard/seen of Dougal Irvine's work so I've booked.
Note to anyone considering this: previews are much cheaper (£16.50 all seats) than the main run, so worth going before PN on 5 May, especially as the theatre no longer offers Pay-What-You-Can at matinees and alas has never had a PAYG scheme like Southwark Playhouse's.
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Post by crabtree on Mar 2, 2016 18:29:09 GMT
Has ever an original show, The beggar's opera, been quite so tinkered with? Leave it alone, please.
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Post by orchestrator on Mar 2, 2016 19:24:33 GMT
Has ever an original show, The beggar's opera, been quite so tinkered with? Leave it alone, please. You could say the same about Romeo and Juliet, or The Tempest, or the original Passion Plays. In the case of Shakespeare the originals are rather good, as are many of the derived works. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen The Beggars’ Opera and it has certainly enjoyed major success at different times but I’m not sure it would feature in anybody’s list of top 10 shows. In the original the plot is arguably less important than the conceit of lampooning a fashionable art form. In some of the, to use your word, “tinkerings” the intentions have been very different. Brecht & Weill’s Threepenny Opera has some of the best songs ever written for the theatre; the plot is still a bit lame but useful to hang Brecht’s political moralising on. I say “Don’t leave it alone; keep messing with it!” |
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Post by profquatermass on Mar 4, 2016 15:52:30 GMT
So the Park Theatre announce this just as the NT are doing the Threepenny Opera just as they have a Nell Gwyn play at the same time as the transferred Globe production. Their programmer really needs to look at Twitter occasionally
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Post by freckles on Mar 4, 2016 16:13:07 GMT
I was quite surprised to see Lauren Samuels cast instead of Julie Atherton. Love them both but Julie has recorded and performed "Do you want a baby, baby?" from this quite extensively and I got the impression she was very closely involved in the project.
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Post by orchestrator on Mar 4, 2016 17:06:00 GMT
So the Park Theatre announce this just as the NT are doing the Threepenny Opera just as they have a Nell Gwyn play at the same time as the transferred Globe production. Their programmer really needs to look at Twitter occasionally London, a city of more than 8 million residents and a large number of theatre-going tourists, can cope, I think. |
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Post by profquatermass on Mar 4, 2016 20:15:38 GMT
So the Park Theatre announce this just as the NT are doing the Threepenny Opera just as they have a Nell Gwyn play at the same time as the transferred Globe production. Their programmer really needs to look at Twitter occasionally London, a city of more than 8 million residents and a large number of theatre-going tourists, can cope, I think. I like the Park Theatre but has it ever had an actual hit? |
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Post by orchestrator on Mar 4, 2016 21:53:01 GMT
London, a city of more than 8 million residents and a large number of theatre-going tourists, can cope, I think. I like the Park Theatre but has it ever had an actual hit? I don’t know but the last time I went there, to see a medium-successful 4-hander American play, it was a full house. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 4, 2016 22:09:46 GMT
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Post by foxa on May 4, 2016 22:27:25 GMT
Show Report:
Playing time: Roughly 2 hours twenty with interval
Animals: None, but there is a comic song about a rat.
Nudity: Nope.
Language: A bit, but appropriate (I'd say) for children 14+
What's it trying to do: Use the Beggars'/Threepenny Opera as the inspiration for a current (or pretty current, its set in the 2012 Olympics) musical satire focusing on media/capitalism/protests
As good as Threepenny Opera: No.
But fun anyway: Yes.
Performers: An endearing cast with some very strong performers: George Maguire is superb as Macheath, funny, mercurial - just wish he'd had a better song or two; Natasha Cottirall (Lucy) was very funny and probably had the closest to a show-stopper song with 'Baby, Baby' number; Lauren Samuels (Polly) sang beautifully and she and Maquire shared a love song early on which was when,after a slightly uncertain beginning, I began to think the show was going to be good and there is a big cast crazy number about a rat that was weirdly enjoyable The competition between Polly and Lucy was one of the show's highlights. Maimuna Memon (Jenny), who according to her bio is only recently out of drama school, is someone to watch - gorgeous voice, joyous presence, threw herself into everything - playing the violin, the guitar, moving props, multi-rolling.
Timely: Lots of references to the Mayor and given the election tomorrow....
So?: A fun evening out. Some bits didn't entirely make sense to me (the fruitarian/vegetable bits, and some of the rhyming couplets worked better than others) but it was enjoyable and different. - I'd recommend it. 4*.
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Post by showgirl on May 4, 2016 22:37:57 GMT
I was really looking forward to this but OH and I were disappointed and left at the interval. Hence I didn't want to be the first to post after seeing the show. That said, the lyrics were clever and the modern targets for satire were well chosen, but there were no distinctive melodies and most of the cast (all but two, I think) were very young, making it a one-note musical in many ways. It wasn't terrible but we felt we'd seen and heard enough and there was no indication that the second half would be any different.
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Post by foxa on May 4, 2016 22:48:15 GMT
That's interesting. I saw Dr Faustus (so bad) earlier this week, so perhaps by contrast this seemed great. A couple of the songs are on the Park Theatre website - I just listened again to 'Love Song' and really do like it. Some of the cast are very young - at the beginning I felt a bit worried that it was going to feel like drama school or am dram production, but then I thought it markedly improved.
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Post by showgirl on May 4, 2016 22:55:59 GMT
I'm glad you enjoyed it, foxa, and I'm sure many others also will. I've nothing against a mainly young cast (though being that much older, I do like to have the odd character I might be better able to relate to) and some of those appearing seemed to have a large and vocal following. I don't get the fuss about George Maguire, though - to me he looked like a younger version of Russell Brand, which was a bit distracting! I'd also seen a really good play beforehand (the matinee of the touring production of The Herbal Bed), so though the two made a good contrast, the first was a hard act to follow.
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Post by raiseitup on May 5, 2016 11:11:02 GMT
I saw this a few days ago, I thought it was alright, George Maguire and Natasha Cottirall were fantastic, Lauren Samuels didn't really seem to do much, the rest of the cast were young, full of energy, but a bit hit and miss overall. Felt it was all a bit preachy by the end.
Some clever lyrics, some decent songs, felt at times it was one part Hamilton, one part Sweeney.
3/5
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Post by Phantom of London on May 5, 2016 23:24:00 GMT
It has a song from the show on last weeks Elaine Paige,nowhere she says hilariously the Beggars Opera wrong and Elaine is delirious for 5 minutes.
Worth a listen.
Saw the show itself and that is worth a miss, found it to be cringeworthy and pretentious.
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Post by raiseitup on May 6, 2016 9:36:53 GMT
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Post by Steffi on May 6, 2016 10:08:57 GMT
Will Mark Shenton ever stop comparing everything to Bend it like Beckham?
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Post by foxa on May 6, 2016 12:03:41 GMT
Yes, because no one on here ever mentions BILB ;-) I think he is right that there are a couple of good songs in The Buskers' Opera - it's the book that causes the problems (especially a number of downright silly deaths in the second half which kills any tension which might have developed) and a scattergun approach to its satiric targets (though compared to Miss Atomic Bomb it is a model of comic precision.) I think this show is worth a punt (though obviously not for everyone, the woman next to us fell asleep during the first half and didn't return for the second.) I don't see it transferring but there are some very entertaining sections and some young performers worth watching, so later you can say, 'I saw them before they were famous doing that weird rat song in Finsbury Park.' This was an interesting review it: oughttobeclowns.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/review-buskers-opera-park.html#more |
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Post by foxa on May 11, 2016 18:14:33 GMT
I know I was a bit of a lone voice in enjoying this, but if anyone else wants to see it message me and I'll send you a code to get £5 off.
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Post by Deleted on May 11, 2016 18:25:44 GMT
Jeez, must be an awful score then! |
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Post by theatremadness on May 23, 2016 21:14:43 GMT
Checking this out tomorrow and quite looking forward to it - especially using the code 'friendlyface' as it gets you £10 tickets, not sure how many performances it's valid for. Just found out there's also a 30 minute Q&A post-show with Dougal Irvine and Mark Shenton, free to all tickets holders. So win-win!!!!
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Post by n1david on May 24, 2016 21:35:22 GMT
Sorry to say we left at the interval tonight despite the prospect of the Q&A. Didn't buy into the charisma of Mack (but then I wasn't a fan of George Maguire in Sunny Afternoon) and the performances, whilst individually decent didn't gel as a company for me...
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