Moulin Rouge - Piccadilly Theatre

Giving the standing room tickets a go tonight. Hopefully they'll at least have a bar to lean on!!

Simon Bailey is SO wrong for the Duke that it defies analysis. How did he get through the audition??? I'd love to see Jon in that role and just about anyone else in any of the other roles: did Alex Timbers even SEE his principal performers?

Badger Bailey is a very nice guy

I went to see this last Thursday, and despite not particularly enjoying the opening 15/20 mins, I left the theatre loving it.

From the moment you head into the auditorium you are literally in the Moulin Rouge. The red drapes, strings of lights all around plus of course the windmill and blue elephant, really set the scene. Having also recently been to Cabaret where you felt as though you were in a nightclub as soon as you stepped into the venue I wonder if this is the way productions with large budgets will go to varying degrees.

The staging looked great, and the use of the two walkways (presumably built over boxes) either side of the stage were used really well to help with entrances and exits from what’s a fairly small stage. As the show developed the sets became ever-more impressive, to the point I was wondering if they’d taken over a building or two next door to accommodate everything in the wings. Really well done and definitely some of the best I’ve seen. I particularly liked Christian’s attic apartment with the rooftops visible beyond.

I think my reason for not loving the opening was simply it’s ‘in your face’ness - with everything including the kitchen sink thrown into the extended first number. Spectacular yes, but almost too much going on to take it all in. It certainly sets out the show’s mission statement, but I enjoyed things more once we settled into the storyline and meeting the characters. Having been a huge fan of Clive Carter in Come From Away he didn’t disappoint in this, and seemed to be having huge amounts of fun as Zidler. Jason Pennycooke was also brilliant as Toulouse and his solo lines at the end of Your Song were really quite moving. Personally I enjoyed Clive and Jason more than the leads, but didn’t feel at all let down by Liisi or Jamie, just that they didn’t stand out for me - maybe I’d been influenced by comments on here about the lack of chemistry but I thought they both did a good job with their characterisation, just perhaps less so with one another.

Highlights for me were Chandelier (who knew life wouldn’t be complete until I’d seen Clive sing this!). Sympathy For the Duke (the Stones lyrics worked really well) and the Elephant Love Medley which was just fantastic. I knew 70-odd songs were included in the show and mashed up but hadn’t listened to the Broadway cast recording so as to be fresh to it on the night and that one really stood out with so many classics woven together. Again, the set was a triumph for this number and the audience loved it.

Speaking of the audience, and having read previous comments on here, it seems we were lucky and didn’t have anyone particularly drunk or disruptive near us to spoil the experience. It did all feel very cramped as a venue with even less room than your average West End theatre to navigate our way around others to get to our seats and to the bathroom and back in the interval. Lots of people very much focused on themselves and drinking / standing in groups in the most awkward of places, unaware of others perhaps needing to get around them, but in fairness there really wasn’t much bar space for more than a handful of people!

We were sat in the centre of stalls row D which is amply close enough - chosen mainly as anything central past this point was priced at premium levels even back when it first went on sale last year. I certainly wouldn’t want to be any closer and I think another three or four rows back would be spot on - or perhaps in the dress circle to take it all in. The Can Can tables looked much too close, with the stage at eye-level and cast members gyrating literally inches from faces. It looked to be an uncomfortable viewing angle from where I was sat, but of course some may enjoy the up close and personal experience!

So yes, I can see where some of the negative reviews have come from, but it’s a hugely enjoyable show nevertheless. They’ve taken the love story, exotic nightclub and the songs from the film, added a load of radio-friendly pop mostly from the past 15 years and thrown in an awful lot of flesh but I suspect this one will be packing out the Piccadilly for a good few years. It’s got girls night out written all over it and the audience seemed to love it. I’ll definitely go back for a second visit at some point soon.

I feel the same - way too many jukebox musicals at the moment.

I think they are referring to Baz Luhrmann?

I've seen them available on the ATG site but only when the show is sold out.

Looks like the can can seats are only being released a week at a time with booking opening on a Friday at 12pm for tickets the following week. Booking exclusively through LondonTheatre.co.uk.

I'd already seen Moulin Rouge in New York and, to be honest, wasn't particularly keen on it. (Mind you, I wasn't wild about the film either - all that choppy editing wasn't to my taste.) I'm a fan of some of Alex Timbers' work (eg, Peter & the Starcatcher, Here Lies Love, American Utopia) but his bigger, more commercial shows haven't done it for me (Moulin Rouge, and Beetlejuice.)

I caught the London production last week - as in New York, it's flashy, and visually impressive, but there's ultimately very little substance to the material which, for me, makes for a rather unengaging evening in the theatre. There are things I enjoyed - Clive Carter seemed to be having a lot of fun, and the staging and choreography of some of the big group numbers was very effective.

But where the London production really misses the mark is in the casting of the male lead. Christian and Satine do, as many have said, lack chemistry... and that's problematic if it causes the audience to struggle to invest in their relationship. (I didn't buy it for a second.)

I did a double-take when they first announced that Jamie Bogyo was going to be playing Christian because I'd seen him at drama school and I distinctly recall his gangly, awkward, wooden presence on stage raising a few sniggers amongst the audience. It just seemed odd to me that Broadway gets Aaron Tveit - who I think it's fair to say is a handsome, charismatic, appealing leading man - and, in London, the producers cast someone whose performance and on-stage presence makes you spend the evening thinking, 'could they really not find anyone better than this to play the lead in a much-hyped, mega-budget hit musical?'

Anyhoo, that's just my two cents.

I heard Ashley Gilmour (previously Enjolras in Les Mis and Chris in Miss Saigon) got quite far in the audition process, but they decided they wanted to go down the route of casting an unknown as Christian instead.

Casting an unknown is fine if they're amazing (hello Sam Tutty) but this choosing this guy just sounds like a complete misfire.

I'm assuming someone fresh out of training or without professional experience. Ashley is at least somewhat of a name in musical theatre I think.