Latest Articles - Page 539 of 656

30Sep

By Andrew LeeNo Comments

North West

Beauty and the Beast – Liverpool Empire

Beauty and the Beast is a Disney classic, a staple of their dominance in the 1990’s when it comes to animated musicals. Coupled with one of the most successful composers of the modern musical, Alan Menken, and Beauty and the Beast has a sure-fire street to success. The play is the story of Belle (Courtney Stapleton), a young girl longing to escape from her dreary everyday life and see the big wide world (you can’t fault Disney for their recycling). Along the way she is captured by a hideous Beast (Emmanuel Kojo), whose only prospect of a return to normality is to love and be loved in return, but first he must learn to leave his selfish self behind. It must be said that in this production the Beast was not all that Beastly, as he still cut a lean, attractive figure throughout. The mar...

Arthur Smith: SYD coming to Waterside Arts in Sale

29Sep

By Paul DownhamNo Comments

NEWS

Arthur Smith: SYD coming to Waterside Arts in Sale

Arthur Smith’s show SYD comes to Waterside Arts in Sale following highly successful season at Soho Theatre and a sell-out and critical acclaimed run at the Edinburgh Fringe. Packed with big gags, hilarious stories and poignant reflections about an ordinary man who lived through extraordinary times; Arthur, accompanied by the mellifluous Kirsty Newton tells the story of his own father. Syd Smith fought at El Alamein, became a P.O.W., and ended the war in the notorious Colditz Castle in Germany. In the 1950s PC Syd patrolled London’s South Bank and met a gallery of characters, whom he tried his best not to arrest. Arthur tells this 20th century story with laughter and song and, quoting directly from his father’s hand-written journal, he splices time, memories and m...

29Sep

By Gaurav SinghNo Comments

London

Tokyo Rose – Southwark Theatre

‘Tokyo Rose was a legend, but Iva Toguri lived.’ It’s this simple yet decisive line, delivered just before its concluding musical number, which encapsulates the interplay between the personal and the political in this extraordinary production. Tokyo Rose is a powerful testament to the life and trials endured by Iva Toguri, an American citizen of Japanese heritage, who was accused of treason by the US Government in the aftermath of the World War II. The title refers to the nickname given to the female radio broadcasters trusted with spreading Japanese propaganda to the Allied Forces and prisoners of war captured by the Axis forces. Blending Iva’s personal journey of coming to terms with the duality of her heritage and upbringing as well as a larger socio-political narrative about the fallou...

Grease the Musical – Festival Theatre Edinburgh

29Sep

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Grease the Musical – Festival Theatre Edinburgh

This production can be viewed two ways; a successful adaptation combining the best of the original, visceral, 1971 Chicago show and the candyfloss of the 1978 film… or something that falls between the two stools of these contrasting affairs. Undeniably it was lively, but frenetic rather than kinetic. The constant movement made for a spectacle but parts of the script, including many of the caustic, witty, one-liners, were lost in the hustle and bustle, denying the audience a glimpse of the themes so vital when Grease first made its impact. The screen greeting the audience prior to the start promised much, decorated with small black & white TV’s, transistor radios, the most modern of things back in the 50’s, both devices carrying – amidst Elvis and Westerns - the advertising that propell...

Layton Williams comes back north in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie at Leeds Grand

29Sep

By Paul ClarkeNo Comments

Interviews

Layton Williams comes back north in Everybody’s Talking About Jamie at Leeds Grand

Bury lad Layton Williams kicked off his stage career travelling down the M62 to join the Billy Elliott training academy in Leeds before graduating aged 12 to take on the lead role in the West End. He went onto play young Michael Jackson in Thriller – Live and as an adult won critical acclaim playing Angel in the 20th anniversary tour of Rent. Now he’s back up north at Leeds Grand Theatre playing Jamie New in uplifting musical Everyone’s Talking About Jamie which has just been made into an Amazon Prime movie. For people who are new to Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, how would you sum up the storyline? Jamie is based on a real character who was the subject of a documentary on BBC Three. I remember watching it years ago and it was about him wanting to be a drag queen and wanting ...

The Rocky Horror Show – Alexandra Birmingham

29Sep

By Peter KinnockNo Comments

West Midlands

The Rocky Horror Show – Alexandra Birmingham

Let the Party and the Sounds Rock On! With all vim, vigour and verve of a lady half her age “The Rocky Horror Show” rocks up horrifically at the Alexandra Theatre and, with a well aimed stiletto, crashes through the stage door and struts her sassy chassis before the goggle-eyed, costume-clad, schlock-worshipping clan of the Rocky fans like the mothership returning home laden with every wicked vice and indecent indulgence your little earthling mind could dream of. Since it slithered from Richard O’Brien’s unfettered imagination somewhere back in the early seventies “Rocky” has evolved, expanded, regenerated and reinvented itself time and time again like an indestructible life form from those beloved 50’s movies it seeks to parody and continues to prove itself unabashedly brash, unasha...

29Sep

By Chris HanlonNo Comments

Yorkshire & Humber

Waitress – Sheffield Lyceum

Theatre is back and Theatre is booming! It is always a privilege to be at the Lyceum Theatre, Sheffield and the excitement was tangible as we awaited curtain up. And what a night it was as Waitress served us a huge slice of incredible pie! Embarking on its first ever UK tour, Waitress is proving to be one of the best new Broadway and West End exports of recent years! I have to say, it was superb from start to finish! The packed Lyceum house were treated to an absolute spectacle filled with laughter and tears in equal measure! Lucie Jones of X-Factor and Eurovision fame was stunning in the role of ‘Jenna’ - the Waitress who despite leading a far from perfect life at home, manages to keep her customers coming back for another piece of her famous pie! Her acting was strong, but it was h...

29Sep

By Jackie FoottitNo Comments

Yorkshire & Humber

Passagers – Hull New Theatre

This is going to be the shortest review I’ve ever written. Here goes: O.M.G! Well, as this is a UK premiere, my reviewer conscience won’t let me stop at just three letters, so I’ll carry on. On a rainy Tuesday night in Hull, a packed house marvelled at the antics of eight super-talented performers, male and female, who go by the name of The 7 Fingers. A short glitch at curtain up meant we were sitting looking at a dark stage for a couple of minutes, but things were soon rectified and from then on it was breathtaking action all the way. The theme of train journeys ran throughout - departures, arrivals and everything else associated with rail travel. Here, I must mention the amazing background scenes and atmospheric lighting and music that accompanied every movement on stage. ...

Back to the Future: The Musical – Adelphi Theatre

28Sep

By Alan Stuart MalinNo Comments

London

Back to the Future: The Musical – Adelphi Theatre

Synchronise your watches folks, because you are about to head back in time at a speedy 88mph with Marty McFly and that famous DeLorean. Exploding onto the stage, London’s Adelphi Theatre’s most recent production is a musical adaptation of Robert Zemeckis’s hit 1985 time-travel movie, ‘Back to the Future: The Musical’. If you are going to open a new West End musical based on a cult 80’s movie classic, then you need to do it with some style, and that’s exactly what ‘Back to the Future: The Musical’ has achieved without compromising at all the legacy of the movies. With music and lyrics by Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard and a book by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale, adapted from their screenplay of the 1985 film, this is a high-tech, multidimensional, magically cinematic production, that qui...

28Sep

By Peter RuddickNo Comments

North West

Cock Therapy – Salford Arts Theatre

Mining therapy sessions for rich drama is not easy. Good stories require therapist characters to play the antagonist and progress the plot. However, in real life, counsellors are generally too passive and neutral meaning believable roles can result in dull tales. So, it's a definite risk for writer Joe Henry to set his first ever play on the psychiatrist's couch. For the most part, it's a risk that pays off. Roz (also played by Henry) believes he is a sex addict. After being dropped off by his dad, our lead enters with a reticence that anyone who has experienced doubts part way through a course of therapy will recognise. After a hilarious opening monologue, Roz is joined by The Therapist (Nicholas Eccles). Over the course of the next 50 minutes or so, layers of Roz's personality and ...