Jemma Churchill Archives - North West End UK

11Feb

By Peter KinnockNo Comments

West Midlands

Fawlty Towers – Wolverhampton Grand

Of course I don’t need to remind you of the high esteem in which Fawlty Towers is held not only by the international comedy loving public but also by comedic contemporaries and comedians of today. It is the one. The first and the best. Bar none. End of. Its first script was once described by an early producer as “a collection of cliches and stock characters which I can’t see being anything but a disaster.” Unlike John Cleese, Prunella Scales, Andrew Sachs and Connie Booth that producer’s name has been consigned to history. We watch the show over and over, without tiring, in abject horror and disbelief as Basil commits the same acts of frustrated stupidity taking his indignation to dizzying heights transcending taboo after taboo. It’s a glorious fusion of British stiff-upper-lipped suppr...

I Should Be So Lucky – Hull New Theatre

If you entered Hull New Theatre on Monday evening, in a grumpy mood, I would bet my meagre life savings your grumps would soon evaporate. Stock Aitken Waterman’s feel-good musical I Should Be So Lucky was a riot of fun, joy, colour, not forgetting hit song after hit song - even though the storyline started off on a sad note. The stage setting throughout was all heart, literally. Wonderful heart shapes that changed colour and texture, fronting a video screen when more movement was needed in the storyline - such as balmy Turkish waters, hot air balloon-filled skies and thunder and lightning. Plus, a “hot air balloon” or rather its basket, was an amazing sight to behold as it floated, with its passengers, around the stage. The story centres around soon-to-be-married Ella (Lucie-Mae S...

I Should Be So Lucky – Sheffield Lyceum

The Hit Factory of the 1980/1990’s punches into the Sheffield Lyceum this week with Stock, Aitken & Waterman’s - I Should Be So Lucky. With over 25 of their top 40 hits packed into this farcical frolic of romance and crazy characters, I was left in a confused state - torn between irresistibility and irritation. The music has the potential to be a great addition to the tradition of jukebox musicals but unfortunately the storyline is just too manic to invest in its characters. With flashes of brilliance and moments that overstep the camp cheesiness into complete cringe – this show is definitely the marmite of musical theatre but just maybe it is meant to be so? With an audience demographic donned with rose coloured spectacles of a bygone era of dancing in their bedrooms to Rick Astle...