Billy Elliot The Musical - Joint UK Tour And West End Thread

Trust Cameron mackintosh to muscle in for some attention.

I think it's a shame they didn't all dance in Electricity considering that's probably the most famous part of the whole show

Yeah, but maybe it was too complicated to work .

I obvs had too high expectations but i assumed the current and old Billy's would have done a dance routine together ( after curtain call and final bows)

He was on stage for the final final bow, so you may have missed him considering the vast amount of people on that stage.

Unless I'm going completely mad. I swear I saw him at the end.

At that time I was busy trying to take photos with my Ipad, then you had a confetti canon go off, then it all ended rather abrbtly.

There is this of the curtain call, but for god sake turn your volume down before you play it!

Has the Billy Elliot posters and everything been taken down from the theatre now? Since the show has closed.

Has anybody seen the tour? How does it differ from the London production?

I imagine the set is more dumbed down, I couldn't imagine the huge staircase set piece gojng below stage in a touring theatre?

I saw it twice in Plymouth.  I thought the standard was equally as good as London, didn't feel it had dumbed-down at all.

The stairs were impressive but wheeled on from the side. 

Saw this in Cardiff on Wednesday.

After seeing this in London many times, Broadway three times and once in Chicago.

Obviously for a tour they couldn't dig a big hole in the middle of the stage for every venue for Billy Elliot's bedroom to appear, they had to improvise here and this bit is simply wheeled on from the side, the set is very realistic of the one in London.

The miners' strike film wheel at the beginning with little boy has been axed.

With all musicals in time they evolve and can get better, this was the case with Billy going to Broadway, they kept the best bits of London and imported changes for the better from Broadway, one of these was the goosebumps moment in the end of act 1, "angry dance"' where you had the Billy dancing with much angst, after missing auditions, against the picket line, with National Coal Board shields, with this as Billy was dancing against the strikers you have Margaret Thatcher's voice boom "these are the wreckers of our society, they must not  succeed", it brings more context to the piece. They did this exactly at the Tony Awards, if anyone wants to you tube this.

From the London production Michael Heseltine is still a wanker, this was taken out for Broadway and indeed the panto scene.

One of my favourite pieces is Tchaikovsky's Swan Lane, the advantage in London you had dry ice jets come out of the stage floor and flood it with ice,they couldn't replicate this for the tour and not enough dry ice was used, so the lake effect was lost, but Billy flying as a (young swan), it was still great.

Generally the cast you get on tour are sub standard to London, pay is less, staying in hotels is not everyones cup of tea, away from their families, therefore you don't attract top talent, but I thought the lady playing Mrs Wilkinson was brilliant and the bloke playing Tony was superb, he deserves his break after playing in Title of the Show above a pub. Billy was excellent as all the children were.

In my top 3 of the best musicals ever written. I urge all to see it.