Review: Heartbreak Hotel at The Jetty – Greenwich Peninsula

Heartbreak Hotel
The Jetty – Greenwich Peninsula
Reviewed on Tuesday 9th June 2015
★★★

Nobody can accuse the creators of Heartbreak Hotel at The Jetty in Greenwich of not committing; this immersive promenade theatre show has certainly been thoroughly executed in terms of design and concept. Arriving at The Jetty and discovering Waltzer and Dodgem seating, a fairground strength test, a fortune teller, a reception and a check-in desk before even stepping into the show proper lets visitors know that no stone has been left unturned, detail-wise. 

Review: Molly Wobbly at the Leicester Square Theatre

Molly Wobbly

Leicester Square Theatre (The Lounge)

Reviewed on Friday 30th January 2015

★★

What to say about Molly Wobbly? It's quite possibly one of the most bizarre and absurd evenings I have spent in a theatre. Reading the programme notes by Paul Boyd, the writer/director, it's clear that the late Christopher Malcolm (the original Brad in The Rocky Horror Show) has had a hand in the nurturing and development of this show: unsurprising as this show has 'cult' written all over it and echoes of that show resound strongly throughout this piece.

Review: Cirque Berserk at Winter Wonderland

Cirque Berserk 

Winter Wonderland

Reviewed on Monday 1st December 2014

★★★

Oh Winter Wonderland, how you have the power to kill or cure the Christmas spirit. The annual festive extravaganza can very easily overpower one with festive cheer though the miasma of holiday joy.

Review: Damn Yankees at the Landor Theatre

Damn Yankees
Landor Theatre

Reviewed on Wednesday 8th October 2014

★★★

Damn Yankees is an odd show, not to mention that the sport of baseball makes a bizarre choice of subject matter for a musical. The addition of a Faustian pact from a devil (Jonathan D Ellis), who does a (hilarious) song and dance number in act two, results in a piece which at times feels more like a bad trip than a night at the theatre. Undeterred, the powers that be at the Landor have decided to revive this old curiosity for 4 weeks at their bijou venue. 

The show originally opened on Broadway in 1955. It's common that musicals of this era combine dialogue, song and dance in equal measure, requiring a cast full of triple-threats; that's a pretty big ask for a profit-share contract which certainly shows in this production. 

Although the dance numbers are universally slick (with dynamic choreography from Robbie O'Reilly) and singing is consistently good, the cast of twenty fare less well when it comes to the implementation of believable dialogue. Some cast members are nearly impossible to understand, some speak in such monotone as to make them totally disinteresting and the accents, in general, are all over the place. If the characters are nearly all supposed to be in Washington, you'd never guess it from the way they talk!

Review: Hundred Story City at the Delfont Room

Hundred Story City

Delfont Room

Reviewed on Friday 5th September 2014

★★★★

Hundred Story City in the sumptuous Delfont Room at the Prince Of Wales theatre provided a great showcase for its wickedly talented cast. Dubbed 'A Concert of Stories Set in New York City', the show opened with 'Rewrite This Story' from Hit List, one of the shows within the show featured on TV series 'Smash'. Alice Fearn and Rob Houchen (pictured above) provided the powerhouse vocals for this number and set the tone for the rest of the night: great songs, great harmonies and a great blend of voices. These two provided the winning combination of the evening.

Review: Zanna, Don't at the Landor Theatre

Zanna, Don't!

Landor Theatre

Reviewed on Thursday 5th June 2014

Zanna, Don’t really lives up to its “A Musical Fairy Tale” subtitle. Colourful, camp and totally unbelievable, the story concerns itself with the exploits of Zanna (played by the very likeable David Ribi), an uber-gay quasi-cupid who makes loves happen in Heartsville, USA, where the story is set. In this alternate universe, homosexuality is ubiquitous: straights are subjected to castigation and prejudice, the ‘football’ jocks worship the chess team and the pretty girls ride mechanical bulls in synchronised routines.

Review: Life Of The Party: A Celebration Of The Songs Of Andrew Lippa at the Menier Chocolate Factory

Life Of The Party: A Celebration Of The Songs Of Andrew Lippa

Menier Chocolate Factory

Reviewed on Friday 30th May 2014

The title of the Chocolate Factory's latest show The Life Of The Party comes from Andrew Lippa's most famous work The Wild Party. The American, though Leeds-born, musical theatre composer's work is showcased during the evening's celebration of his oeuvre.

The show has a stellar cast and some incredible performances. The biggest treat of the night, though, isn't Menier favourite Damian Humbly, MT royalty Caroline O'Connor or second sister of the Strallen dynasty, Summer - all of whom do a fantastic job, but Lippa himself. Who knew the composer could sing so ably and put himself across so well? From the offset the audience are left in no doubt that the star of this show is the composer and impressive catalogue of work.

Lippa's writing, at its best, bursts with rhythm, humour, colour and passion and much of that is present here: from the painful & conversational recitative of 'Love Somebody Now', via the recognisable family dynamics of 'Little League' from his first-produced show to the imploring encouragement of 'I Do What I Do' from his most current work in-development. Lippa has that rare gift of writing songs you can feel inside of you: their accompaniment pounds in your chest whilst their words spin around in your head - for three minutes you are submerged in the character's world.

Review: The Mikado at the RISE

The Mikado

The RISE

Reviewed on Tuesday 20th May 2014

This production of The Mikado, staged at the Rise 'superclub', Leicester Square, re-imagines the show with a chorus line of Ladyboys instead of the usual ensemble of school boys, nobles and guards.

Review: West End Switched Off Album Launch at the St James Studio

West End Switched Off Album Launch 

St James Studio

Reviewed on Sunday 27th April 2014

What a difference eight months can make! When last I reviewed West End Switched Off back in September last year, Parallel Productions was launching this concept aboard the Battersea Barge. Fast forward to last night at the St James' Studio and the sold-out launch of the first album in a planned series of releases. The concert was made up of songs from the new album and other fresh, unorthodox arrangements of musical theatre material: both standards and more unusual Broadway material.

Review: The Beloved at the Drayton Arms Theatre

The Beloved

Drayton Arms Theatre

Reviewed on Tuesday 22nd April 2014

It was a promising start for The Beloved at the Drayton Arms Theatre, Gloucester Road: an inebriated Anna wanders around the stage, constantly drinking from the ever ready, omnipresent alcohol available in Dacter Pinch's ingenious design. Her constant refrain: "Any minute now he'll get out of bed, put on his clothes and walk through the door." She is talking about her husband Jeremy, currently in a coma after a near-fatal drink driving incident.

Review: The Man Inside at the Landor Theatre

The Man Inside

Landor Theatre

Reviewed on Thursday 13th March 2014

The Man Inside is a new take on the classic novella Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson: many will be familiar with Leslie Bricusse and Frank Wildhorn's musical adaptation, Jekyll and Hyde. It was with some trepidation that I took my seat for this performance at the Landor, then, having endured more than one performance of it's better-known equivalent. This version by Tony Rees and Gary Young is a far smaller affair - a chamber piece with just three actors and two musicians.

Review: Tell Me On A Sunday at the St James Theatre

Tell Me On A Sunday

St James Theatre

Reviewed on Wednesday 8th January 2014

I had to look more than twice at the email inviting me to review 'Tell me on a Sunday' with the original star Marti Webb: Had they cloned Marti Webb twenty five years ago and matured the new Webb expressly for the purpose of playing the role in 2014? Would the script be rewritten so lead character 'the girl' no longer writes to her octogenarian-by-now mum but some younger relative? All these questions and more swirled around my mind as I took my seat at the shiny new St. James' theatre in Victoria, now in its second year.

Review: That Face at the Landor Theatre

That Face

Landor Theatre

Reviewed on Thursday 14th November 2013

There's only one piece of set in Polly Stenham's That Face; a large double bed. It never moves. Around this bed, all of the action takes place. It's upon this bed that we witness the humiliation and drugging of Alice (Imogen Byron) in a boarding-school initiation ceremony gone horrible wrong at the opening of the play. It's also where we find Henry and Martha (Caroline Wildi) as they awaken in the next scene.

Review: The Fastest Clock In The Universe at the Old Red Lion Theatre

The Fastest Clock In The Universe

Old Red Lion Theatre

Reviewed on Saturday 9th October 2013

It's hard to believe it's been twenty one years since the premiere of Philip Ridley's The Fastest Clock in the the Universe, mainly because the play has aged so well and concerns itself with the very current preoccupations of vanity, ageing and society's obsession with youth and beauty.

Review: Rent at the Tabard Theatre

RENT

Tabard Theatre

Reviewed on Thursday 8th August 2013

For my generation the Pulitzer Prize winning musical RENT by Jonathan Larson symbolised our youth. The rock musical was the Jesus Christ Superstar of our generation and represented a paradigm shift in modern musical theatre towards the end of the twentieth century. It's no surprise, then, that its undergoing somewhat of a renaissance of late and has had no less than four productions in the last twelve months.

Review: All Saints at the Last Refuge

All Saints

The Last Refuge

Reviewed on Tuesday 18th June 2013

All Saints, a new play by Nicola Baldwin, concerns itself with the dilapidated titular Church in Peckham and its dwindling congregation. Lead by recently-arrived vicar Stella, the church is on the precipice of collapse, both in terms of the building itself and its lack of engagement with the local community. Towards the start of the play, Stella talks longingly of vibrant church communities in local warehouses and shop fronts and she longs to bring that fervour into her ailing flock.