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Post by ali973 on Aug 10, 2018 15:36:06 GMT
I'll always have an affection for 'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg'. Not only did I thoroughly enjoy it but it introduced me to Meow-Meow. The artist I mean, not the street drug. Although . . . I think she sat on my lap. Or we had eye sex. Something happened, but we connected because I was sitting in the front row. Oh, and Cynthia Erivo going "da ding ding ding". I kept my eyes on that girl knowing she'd go places. Little did I know she'd become a social media monster too. |
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Post by n1david on Aug 10, 2018 15:50:42 GMT
I'll always have an affection for 'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg'. Not only did I thoroughly enjoy it but it introduced me to Meow-Meow. The artist I mean, not the street drug. Although . . . I know they did a recording of the Umbrellas, but it's never surfaced - I'd love to have it. Meow Meow was great, those matelots, and that sensational Michel Legrand music. They used new English language translations for the songs which I don't believe have ever been made available (the film is my favourite film of all time so I went in nervous and came out happy, and sobbing) I liked Closer to Heaven and Moby Dick, although recent revivals make me wonder if I was less critical in those days. Stephen Ward's second act - the legal proceedings - was terminally dull. I saw From a Jack to a King in a pre-West End tryout upstairs at Raymonds Revue Bar. It was obviously an attempt to do a Forbidden Planet-type show. Of course, a show like that using rock music to animate a pseudo-historic story would never make it to the West End now... |
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2,264 posts
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Post by richey on Aug 10, 2018 15:53:36 GMT
Surprised to see some if those classed as flops. Acorn Antiques was certainly a big seller both times I went
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Post by indis on Aug 10, 2018 15:55:41 GMT
does Love never dies count as a flop aswell?
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:00:09 GMT
Ah, the glorious 'Acorn Antiques'. Back in the day when £65 for a top price ticket was considered outrageous.
And it was worth every penny as far as I was concerned.
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Post by greeny11 on Aug 10, 2018 16:04:14 GMT
I really enjoyed Loserville, Made In Dagenham and The Girls.
I think Loserville was always intended to be a show that could be performed by schools, and it has been many times - it just didn't quite feel right for the West End.
Made In Dagenham was at too big a theatre - it might have done better at a smaller theatre. It does seem to have done well at regional/amateur level though.
The Girls had 2 problems - the name and the theatre. Had it been called Calendar Girls the Musical - it may well have done better as people are familiar with the Calendar Girls. It also was at the Phoenix, which is not in a great location with limited passing trade. A more centrally located theatre might have seen this one do better.
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Post by karloscar on Aug 10, 2018 16:06:10 GMT
Metropolis was one of the most magnificent flops. Brian Blessed was Brian Blessed on acid, the set was amazing when it worked, the songs were tuneful, though the lyrics sucked, Graham Bickley was the drippiest leading man ever and then Judy Kuhn made you forget all that was wrong with it. Her ability to make dodgy material truthful and compelling is quite unbelievable.
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Post by londonmzfitz on Aug 10, 2018 16:09:14 GMT
@cardinalpirelli has named many that I really enjoyed! Except La Cava which I walked out of at the end could have jumped under a bus, so solemn and frankly dire. I found the programme last week, I remembered that Ben Forster (JCS show winner) was in it, hiding behind a huge beard ... )
Loved loved loved From A Jack To A King which won the Evening Standard award, saw it several times. And Lend Me A Tenor, went back a couple of times - I have a signed poster at home from the old WOS member night. I saw Damien Humbley at the Funny Girl final performance and felt the need to tell him how much I loved his performance.
Did not enjoy All The Fun of the Fair, that David Essex thing. Although I love David Essex, saw him on tour several times on the run up to the stage show, he'd perform a song "from this show wot I wrote" so went along to Wimbledon to see it. Dear God, he'd have done better spending his time talking to a budgie than writing that drivel.
Peggy Sue was unremarkable and without humour, same for Love Story, both well performed but left feeling somehow unsatisfied.
From Here To Eternity I enjoyed as a one-off, didn't feel the need to see it again and although I've got the show saved off Sky TV I only dip in now and again. Saw the huge amount of (-tat-) merchandise and thought they'd struggle to flog that off.
I Can't Sing, saw it and hated it, utterly daft and pointless, on a free ticket, cursing the fact I'd bought a £10 front row for later in the run. Second time I saw some redeeming features. But not many.
And although it has its fans I really didn't like Made In Dagenham. At all. Saw that on a free ticket after doing a couple of hours in a product review with half a dozen other people. We didn't know MID was the product, they dragged out several show posters with different pictures and quotes/headlines and asked which we liked more, some people thought there was just women in it, there was a discussion as to whether Lee Evans was in it (same time as his run in Barking In Essex) ....
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:10:22 GMT
Surprised to see some if those classed as flops. Acorn Antiques was certainly a big seller both times I went It’s an interesting one, it sold out but had mixed reviews, it could have extended but, if it had, would probably not have had the names from the TV sketches that sold it, so it didn’t recast and closed. On top of that it was radically changed for a tour which jettisoned the entire first act, suggesting that Wood knew it wasn’t working as well as it could. The show was far too long for the material before the changes. |
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Post by londonmzfitz on Aug 10, 2018 16:10:49 GMT
does Love never dies count as a flop aswell? Maybe to Sir ALW who made several changes during the run. Having seen it from the first preview to the last day I wouldn't call it a flop, it ran for 18 months, cast recording, etc. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:27:24 GMT
Matador, Lautrec, The Beautiful and the Damned, Betty Blue Eyes, Love Story and Made in Dagenham stand out as shows that I thought worked well.
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Post by partytentdown on Aug 10, 2018 16:29:45 GMT
I really enjoyed Loserville, Made In Dagenham and The Girls. I think Loserville was always intended to be a show that could be performed by schools, and it has been many times - it just didn't quite feel right for the West End Will have to check my programme but I vaguely recall that (oddly) it was actually developed by a school or youth group and then taken on by a West end producer. |
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Post by partytentdown on Aug 10, 2018 16:30:17 GMT
'Standing in a huddle outside the Comedy Theatre during the interval, five theatre buffs were debating whether to bother with the second half of Too Close to the Sun, the new West End musical based on the final days of Ernest Hemingway. The group all worked in the theatre business and had been given free tickets for one of the previews used by producers to test the water before opening the show to the public ... and the critics. On leaving their seats for the interval, they had been asked by a manager to stop laughing at inappropriate moments because it was "distracting and upsetting" the cast.' www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/news/stop-laughing-its-not-a-comedy-bell-tolls-for-hemingway-musical-1760704.html |
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Post by indis on Aug 10, 2018 16:30:44 GMT
Made in Dagenham was so boring, was thinking about leaving
didn't it tour through the Uk as well?
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Post by n1david on Aug 10, 2018 16:34:48 GMT
<whispers> Bend it Like Beckham?
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:35:14 GMT
'Standing in a huddle outside the Comedy Theatre during the interval, five theatre buffs were debating whether to bother with the second half of Too Close to the Sun, the new West End musical based on the final days of Ernest Hemingway. The group all worked in the theatre business and had been given free tickets for one of the previews used by producers to test the water before opening the show to the public ... and the critics. On leaving their seats for the interval, they had been asked by a manager to stop laughing at inappropriate moments because it was "distracting and upsetting" the cast.' www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/news/stop-laughing-its-not-a-comedy-bell-tolls-for-hemingway-musical-1760704.htmlOh that sounds smashing, I wish I'd seen it. My favourite bit of that article though is: "On one night when one of the cast members shouted the line "Enough", one member of the audience was heard to shout back "quite!"" Fabulous. |
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Post by Marcus on Aug 10, 2018 16:35:23 GMT
I loved I can’t sing, it was exactly what it needed to be. Frivolous and funny, it also featured a brilliant cast - Cynthia Erivo was perfect.
Made in Dagenham I enjoyed more that I was expecting to, Gemma Artherton was really good. Found parts of it quite emotional.
Viva Forever was my least favourite show of all time, I thought the songs were all slowed down for no reason. The storyline was interesting but for a show with spice girls music I felt they shouldn’t have had a girl band as the central theme. Also what made mamma Mia so popular is its camp and high energy nature. Viva forever tried to be too deep.
I also loved drowsy chaperone, the music was a big draw for me prior to viewing. Loved Summer Strallen (always do) and I sat next to Judith Charmers in the audience.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:42:45 GMT
<whispers> Bend it Like Beckham? Ran about ten months, so around 350 performances. Unsuccessful, I’d say, rather than a flop. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 16:46:42 GMT
I remember commenting that the dire quality of this show turned it from Always into 9½ Weeks (which was the length of its run). Now this one I liked. Someone involved in the production of the show promoted it on rec.arts.theatre.musicals and was terribly confused by the reaction when people jokingly treated it as a rip-off of our own (fictional) Slut Bitches From Pluto. It was a great show that did everything it could not to take itself seriously. Glitter Boots saved my life indeed. Crap. Someone on RATM started a Tess Survivors Club, and it warranted it. I still have my La Cava mug. I don't remember it well, but IIRC it was a show with great potential that could have been a lot better with some tightening up. Loved this. So many great musical numbers. I'll never forgive them for not making a cast recording. I almost invested in this one as they were trying to get small investors involved and I thought I might give it a try, but I dodged a bullet there because it undeservedly sank like a stone. Possibly the worst musical ever. Utter sh*t. This one was pretty good too. Do you mean Behind The Iron Mask? Oh God! Not the worst show ever, but certainly the most unrelentingly boring one. A bit slow in places, but well worth seeing. |
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Post by Jon on Aug 10, 2018 16:46:57 GMT
Surprised to see some if those classed as flops. Acorn Antiques was certainly a big seller both times I went Acorn Antiques was very successful but it only ran a limited run because of cast availability. Made in Dagenham I did enjoy as well. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 17:00:24 GMT
Hard Times - Brian Blessed and Roy Hudd both chewing the scenery magnificently. Why Hard Times though? It never really convinced that it needed to be a musical, for me. There is no cast album but there was a CD EP of five songs, available used on Amazon for about a fiver shipped (as of now)! castalbums.org/recordings/Hard-Times-2000-Original-London-Cast/4693/Behind the Iron Mask, yes, that’s the title. Dull, dull, dull. |
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 17:01:03 GMT
Viva Forever. Must we really go there? It could have been an okay show if they did a better job with the song selection. Some of the songs didn't even sound recognizable. I never saw it but the Mama/Goodbye clip that is on YouTube gives me chills everytime. |
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Post by Jon on Aug 10, 2018 17:12:06 GMT
I think Viva Forever suffered from the fact the Spice Girls didn't have enough songs to justify a stage musical and the story was not as strong compared to Mamma Mia! Hannah John Kamen came out unscathed as she has starred in three major Hollywood films this year and Tamara Wall ended up in Hollyoaks.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 10, 2018 17:13:59 GMT
I'll throw a few out there... I really enjoyed Viva Forever! Also, Women On the Verge and Made in Dagenham deserved more than it got.
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Post by Stephen on Aug 10, 2018 17:34:02 GMT
The Girls was the best musical I saw that year. Glad it has this new life on tour but not convinced by the redesign.
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