A Big Night Of Musicals - AO Arena Manchester / BBC1

Oh my god I'm not insane! I knew she was American but then she was on The One Show not long ago with a complete British accent and I was so confused. Then I saw a clip of her on Stars in the House and she was back to totally American and I assumed I must have just been mad the second time. I'm glad to know it wasn't me haha.

I really enjoyed it, great to see west end and touring musicals included.

Highlights for me were Chelsea Halfpenny, dreamgirls and beauty and the beast - the chemistry between belle and beast seems a big improvement on the original beast at the start of the tour.

Was just thinking the same. Dreadful. But she did a decent attempt at tap in Anything Goes.
Also interesting hearing the difference in her voice as she gets older.
And the strange sets for the 2 Ronnie's shows. Nothing to do with the songs at all.

More songs. There are extras on the iPlayer too

I've only been watching the odd clip over the evening and the main impression is she never looked comfortable on telly in the early days, not helped by the fashion choices and hairdonts. ( Barbara Dickson's many Two Ronnies appearances look and sound great by comparison). I was quite impressed by the I'm Still Here rewrite and was surprised Sondheim would've known details of her career like winning Rear of the Year etc, then she revealed it was Anthony Drewe who'd done it, and it made much more sense. Quite funny though, especially the audience only seeing a turban running up and down the Sunset stairs.

So pleased I’ve seen this before seeing her next week. I hadn’t heard any reports and was getting worried but that was lovely.

Bizarre big finish…surely the Disney bit would have been a more obvious and more enjoyable finale?

Maybe having Disney earlier so kids could watch before bed?

I listened again to quite a few performers and lots had breathing issues I thought - it’s more apparent on the quieter and and softer songs like beauty and the beast but her tone and riffs were really good I thought and their chemistry was very strong.

Either way, it's refreshing for the occasional reminder that the West End universe doesn't revolve entirely around Mac & Cheese (or as they're professionally known Cameron Mackintosh and Andrew Lloyd Webber)

I’m really looking forward to Chelsea now, especially after her interview on radio 2 this afternoon. When asked how she prepares herself to sing SUTBM, she gave a very down to earth reply about after having gone through all that comes before in the show it just comes out. I’ll look forward to seeing more of her on stage and in the future.

Kinda disappointed to hear there was a Les Mis song, even though JOJ is one the best musical theatre performers ever.

One thing I really liked was the lack of the old West End war horses (except Lion King I guess). So boring seeing Bring Him Home again and again and again…

The Manchester arena is horrible. I absolutely hate it as a venue. If your seat is on the floor level you basically have to walk down a huge flight of stairs from the rafters down to the floor with no handrail. I’m staggered that no one’s been killed from falling down them. 
If you’re sitting in the middle or top tiers you may as well be watching the act on tv. Except that you’d get a better view on tv. When I saw Barbra Streisand we paid a fortune for seats up at the top to find that much of the video wall, the only chance of seeing her close up, was obscured by the huge suspended speaker rig. 

If I never go to another arena show I’d be very happy.