Spitting Image The Musical - Birmingham Rep / Phoenix

I hadn't realised the modern re-imagining had been so well recieved as to warrant a stage show.

Im certainly intrigued. I know Disney supposedly never brought a stage muppet show as the puppets were too small. Avenue Q got around it by adding the puppeteer to the character (instead of hiding them).

Wed 1 Feb–Sat 11 Mar 2023 at Birmingham Rep

Priority booking open, online booking from 12pm on Thursday.

www.birmingham-rep.co.uk/whats-on/spitting-image-live/

It was previously reported for the West End, so I guess it makes sense to have pre-WE run at the Rep with Sean Foley’s involvement.

With the stage show next year, I'm hoping for some of the songs from the show. Who can ever forget the classic "The Chicken Song?

Although I think it worked at the time, because at that point, the South Africans that Brits were likely to meet would be white, because they were the only ones with the rights and means to travel. Singing "there are no nice South Africans" would be wrong, but at the time I suspect that most Brits had only met white South Africans, many of whom were at the time not very nice.

Fully expecting this to be a stinker

I also saw opening night and generally agree with the report above except I quite liked the Stomzy bit!
Very much a first preview. We saw more stage management on stage than we should off and there was much scribbling in notebooks by the creative team that were sat near me.
However I'm sure it will get slicker very quickly.
The puppeteers are amazing and work so hard, with dancing and many quick changes in and out of different puppets as well.
I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting but the production values were much higher than I expected.
The sound is a problem, the balance should be an easy fix but being able to adjust the pacing to match the audience reaction on the fly will be challenging.
There are only 3 writers credited and they have done a good job and it is a show rather than a series of sketches but I reckon a bigger team would have punched up the script a bit.
Well worth the visit but I think I would advice giving them a few more shows to bed it down before seeing it.

I wonder if it'll have a further life after the Birmingham run?

Anyone tell me what the loud bangs are detailed in the guidance on the reps website are?!

"Idiots Assemble - Spitting Image Saves the World: Live on Stage", to give it its full title, turns out to be very enjoyable. The puppets and puppeteers are phenomenal. Act 1 is well shaped and ends with the funniest part of the show. Act 2 falls a bit flat towards the end and could do with a more rousing finale.

The sound issues reported in previews have not been fixed. From the centre of row B, I lost a lot of the song lyrics and a little dialogue. Sometimes it was drowned out by music and sometimes it was simply unclear. At one point Ian McKellen's puppet was extreme stage right but his dialogue was heard stage centre. I think the array of speakers across the front of the stage were all taking the same output.

A puppet -- I forget which -- exclaims that they're not Muppets, but the faux proscenium arch with box seats either side of red velvet curtains is reminiscent of the Muppet Show. Instead of Statler and Waldorf in the Royal Box, we have Harry and Meghan.

There is a story of sorts, through which we are guided by Sir Ian. The sheer number of elaborate puppets, some of which appear only for seconds, is quite something to behold. As a Liverpool FC fan, I particularly enjoyed Jürgen Klopp While Braverman's puppet has rightly been singled out for praise, my top choice would be Therese Coffey. Hers is a stroke of genius. Other highlights include the performance by Carrie Johnson's "boys", the revelations about Paddington Bear, and four female Tory ministers out riding their "stallions".

The set design and choreographed numbers, including a couple from Cabaret, are of a pleasingly high standard.

Politically, you are more likely to enjoy this show if you are anti Tory. As with the tv show of old, Tories are attacked for being evil but Labour merely for being useless.

Other advice would be to not sit too far back, as some of the characters are only two-foot tall. The show is also not for the prudish.

Four stars.

Act 1: 19:35-20:35
Act 2: 20:55-21:51

I would guess a London run as there are a few theatres available that could easily house it