Reginald made a fair point about people’s sensitivities when they attend performances like his – you really need to suspend any you have at the door and enjoy the performance for what it is – comedy. Comedy, after all, is about laughing and not taking anything too seriously otherwise what is the point of it.

As can be guessed from the title of Reginald’s show he sets out to be as controversial as he can. Apparently his ads have been banned from the underground and buses due to the “N” word and previous viewers of his show have called him anti-semitic and mysognistic. Its true that Reginald seemingly holds very strong opinions about racial matters but the point is that he is not gratuitously offensive about expressing his views. And, at the end of the day, you don’t have to agree with what he says.

The first half of the show was utterly brilliant with the jokes coming thick and fast taking apart all races, but in particular the African-Americans and the Jewish, in a very original and funny manner. He argues that the “N” word is not about African-Americans feeling oppression from its use but about the white man’s guilt of things done in the past. He argues that life is all about the deals that we make with ourselves and with the world. He definitely presented a range of thought-provoking ideas about how we view the world and our place in it.

The second half of the show seemed a little less brilliant with jokes becoming a little more crass and deliberately provoking. For example, at one stage he asked who in the audience had seen their own “@sshole” and that discussion when on for some time. I could kind of see where he was going with asking that question but after the intelligent dialogue of the first half came as somewhat of a disappointment. He also got slightly more preachy which only added to the feeling that, as Jenny said, the show would have been better if he had stopped at the half time break.

There is no doubt that Reginald D Hunter is a brilliant comic who puts plenty of thought into his material. When he was on fire his comedy was spot on but unfortunately his moments of low brow comedy made this otherwise perfect show less than perfect.

Wicked is definitely one of the bigger ticket items currently on show at the West End. Its a musical that I’ve been wanting to see ever since I heard that it was being transferred here from Broadway (I think I read somewhere it is the highest grossing show in Broadway history.) Pat was nice enough to give me some tickets for my birthday – the only problem was finding a suitable date for it! When I heard that Idina Menzel, who originally played Elphaba the Wicked Witch in the Broadway production and for which she won a Tony, was not continuing on with the role in the New Year I finally got my act together to arrange to see it tonight.

Wicked, based on the novel by Gregory Maguire, tells the tale of how the Wicked Witch of the West came into being. The story starts way before Dorothy ever stepped onto the golden path to the Emerald City with a little green girl, Elphaba, who grows up to be known as the infamous “Wicked ” witch. Elphaba is a girl with a heart of gold but because of the colour of her skin is ridiculed and generally put down. When she finds herself roomed with the eternally popular Galinda, a girl who has everything, life cannot seem to get any worse. Despite the anomosity between the two they eventually become the best of friends.

The Good

The writing in the play is extremely smart with the key message being basically not a judge a book by its cover, or, a person by their appearance, though there are some political references in there as well. It turns around what you thought might have thought was “good” in The Wizard of Oz into “bad” and the “bad” into “good”. The writing too was very smart in incorporating little satirical references to The Wizard of Oz with almost all of these references being met with laughter by the crowd.

Wicked is currently being hosted by the Apollo Victoria and it is a HUGE venue. The set is truly amazing extending out quite significantly into what is traditionally audience space. Also there is a giant dragon which, although in the end not truly serving a purpose, is pretty cool as a design prop. The individual scenes moved seemlessly into each other and there is some damn good engineering in the very sophisticated set. The lighting was inventive and costumes creative.

Interestingly there seemed to be a lot of subtext in the storyline and although there is a love triangle of sorts with Elphaba and Galinda (later to become Glinda the Good Witch) both falling in love with the same man, Fiyero (played by Australia’s own Adam Garcia), there seemed to be something even stronger between Elphaba and Galinda which is pretty cool.

As for the performers Idina Menzel was brilliant, and moving, as Elphaba bringing the right balance of vulnerability and strength to the character and Helen Dallimore, also an Aussie, as Galinda wasn’t too bad at playing all bubbly and blonde.

The Not So Good

The only truly disappointment to the show is the weakness in the song tunes. The lyrics were brilliant no doubt about it but unfortunately for me some of the songs just weren’t catchy or memorable. Though who am I to judge it considering I think the original cast album won a couple of Grammy awards!

Wicked is a show that must be seen, if not for the spectacle of the show itself (visually stunning), then for the intelligence in the writing and the brilliant performances. Definitely thought-provoking it is the direction that all future musicals should be taking.

Four big stars and four very professional performances. Considering I was seeing this play at a similar time to last week’s Six Dances in Six Weeks, namely in its first week on stage, the four actors, Kristen Johnston, Michael McKean, Cillian Murphy, and Neve Campbell, were remarkable. Line delivery was spot on and each actor was extremely comfortable with their physical restraints on stage. I was very impressed with how each actor, except perhaps for Neve Campbell who I felt was the weakest of the four, actually became their characters.

The play tells the story of Beane (played by Cillian Murphy) who is somewhat touched – he lives a lonely life and his only possessions are a table, one chair, a couch, a lamp, a cup, a spoon, a toothbrush and some socks. His sister Joan (Kristen Johnston) and her husband Harry (Michael McKean) are around but too busy in their own lives to pay him too much attention. One night Beane’s apartment is robbed and suddenly Beane is a new man confident, happy with the world and seemingly in love with a girl called Molly (Neve Campbell.)

Billed as a romcom this play was extremely extremely funny. I was laughing throughout the whole play especially when Kristen Johnston was on stage. In a word Kristen Johnston was brilliant. The only weakness in the play was the interaction with Molly. Though the character was central to the play I felt that at times the words flowing between her and Beane were over-indulgent and spoken for the sake of speaking rather than adding meaning to the play. The play was also very moving and you couldn’t help but feel for Beane. I especially could sympathise with the fear of leaving his apartment to get out and see the real world so to see him overcome this in the end was

Without giving away too much about the play you can read as deep into the play as you want. On the surface its about love and the hope it inspires. At a deeper level you might see its about survival and whether love is something we’ve created to justify the mad feelings we sometimes experience. Either way it is a truly entertaining play and should be scene before it closes in March next year.

Phantom of the Opera has been on my to do list for quite some time now and tonight I finally got the chance to go. The musical has been around for what seems like forever and has been at its current venue, Her Majesty’s Theatre Haymarket, for just about 20 years.

The Phantom tells the story of a mysterious masked man who haunts a particular opera house. He has been secretly teaching a chorus member, Christine, to sing and finds himself falling in love with her. She however is in love with another man. Of course, this is not good news for anyone.

The musical is pretty magnificent but you have to admit its had a long time to iron out the wrinkles so to speak. The setting is gorgeous with an incredible amount of detail going into the sets and the stage decorations. We were sitting about 5 rows from the front and we really felt we were in the thick of the action including the swinging chandelier which came very close to wiping out several of the cast members (intended I’m sure.) In fact, I felt very creeped out at times by the haunting feel of the show. The costumes are beautiful with the masquerade scene being particularly striking.

Performance wise the singing and acting was superb combined with a great orchestra. I am constantly amazed by the performers who do this day in day out and who still manage to give a performance that is fresh and full of energy.

All in all it combined to deliver something truly entertaining though the subject matter is a little too dark and tragic for my liking.

A 2-person play starring Billy Zane and Claire Bloom Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks is a sweet story of an unlikely friendship between two people with their own particular insecurities. On the one hand is the fiery but straight-laced retiree and on the other is her outlandish acid-tongued gay instructor. Foxtrotting, waltzing, tangoing and cha-chaing their way through the six weeks of lessons the two turn their angry exchanges into a heart-warming and life changing relationship.

The play is smartly written with plenty of laughs and wit. The dancing too was a pleasure to witness even if they didn’t do any salsa 🙂 although the changes between scenes (to give us the impression that a week had passed and also to allow the actors a change of costume) seemed to drag on a bit. I’m not sure if that had any thing to do with the fact that tonight’s performance was the first for the season.

This is the one major drawback of going to see previews as although you’ll generally get cheaper tickets it also means the actors are likely to mess up their lines (which they did), stumble around on stage (which they did) and have lack of timing such as accidentally talking over each other (which they had.) However, there are some positives to attending first nights such as spouses of the actors coming to see the play. Kelly Brook, Billy Zane’s fiance and also a British model (she is very very pretty), was in one of the boxes and it was a toss up as to who I was watching more! Just kidding though I did catch myself looking over to her to see how she was reacting to the play.

Six Dance Lessons in Six Weeks is a light hearted feel good comedy. Once the actors get into their groove, pardon the pun, will no doubt have you dancing your way into the theatre to see it.

The ever creative Momix group once again brings to the Peacock Theatre a stunning visual and creative production entitled Lunar Sea. The performance is an enchanting mixture of illusion, acrobatics, dance and puppetry. All night you’ll be asking yourself how on earth they managed “that”! Whoever thought of combining the stage, UV/black lighting, giant projections, dance and acrobatics was clearly having a moment of brilliance.

What did we see tonight? Well, we saw bodies seemingly flying and soaring through the air, bodies swimming like dolphins, angels, insects giving birth to and then devouring each other, jelly fish, and a flock of gulls going about their business. Plus much much more. Just when you think you’ve figured out the trick behind the act something else happens to make you question what you once thought was a rational deduction. After a while you learn that you might as well just sit back and let the spectacle wash over you. All of this was also accompanied by a pretty cool tribal soundtrack.

The optical illusion stuff is not all there is to the show – the performers themselves are amazing and use the mixture of ballet and acrobatics to great effect. At the end, if you stay for the encore, each performer has their own little solo which gives us a taste of their skills.

Slightly distracting was the screen that sat at the front of the stage, a necessary barrier between us and the performers, upon which was projected such themes as moon scenes, sunflowers, and flowing waters. Half the time I didn’t realise it was even changing but the other half of the time I found it a little intrusive. The only other negative to the show was the lack of true depth in the story – on their own each little piece was interesting but did leave you wondering if there was any sort of central theme being progressed.

Overall a thoroughly enjoyable production that is a quite different from most things you’ll find in the West End.

Apparently back by popular demand this afternoon the Albert Hall played host to the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s Best of Broadway programme for just one day. We should have known just how the afternoon was going to play out when we saw the type of audience today’s Best of Broadway attracted. Its fair to say that the average age of the audience was UNLIKELY to be below, say, 50 years old?! Not that there is anything wrong with that. The funniest thing I saw was someone knitting whilst waiting for the Orchestra to start!

So the actual programme was good if a little unexciting. Also, considering the number of Broadway productions I’ve seen, at least half of the songs seemed strangely unfamiliar though I’m pleased that the ensemble included songs from such shows as The Lion King, Chicago, The Phantom of the Opera, Mamma Mia, Cats, Evita, Guys and Dolls, and Les Misérables. There were also a few songs from some shows new to the West End: Spamalot and Wicked.

The Orchestra were superb but were let down somewhat by the four West End singing “stars” – two women and two men whom I can’t even remember their names. The two women were alright but the two men weren’t the best singers and at times the singers actually almost overwhelmed the Orchestra! However I was well impressed with how they smoothly introduced each song despite no real conneciton between each. Oh and the conductor was quite the funny guy too.

An okay way to spend a Sunday afternoon though I do admit to catching myself yawning a few times!

Jen decided at the last minute that she wanted to check out the ballet. Well, actually, a ballet has been on her to do list for quite some time but she has only just finished planning her trips away so tonight was the perfect opportunity to check something out at the Royal Opera House.

The only other time I’ve seen a proper ballet was when I went to Russia last year for Christmas. The ballet we saw there, whilst amazing, was a mixture of set pieces so I couldn’t turn down the chance to see a ballet which actually had a story that we could follow from start to finish. It also helps that I was well familiar with Sleeping Beauty fairytale.

The Royal Opera House is HUGE and tickets are commensurately HUGELY expensive. Still the price was worth it because the ballet was simply beautiful, not to mention long. At three hours including two intervals I was surprised I wasn’t more restless throughout the performance. And that’s because it was simply enchanting with gorgeous backdrops, grand stage props, beautiful costumes, a very expressive orchestra and of course the ballerinas (male and female as I’m not sure what a male ballerina is called) were truly graceful. You can see why little girls (and some little boys :)) want to grow up to be ballerinas. Oh, and their legs were great!

I don’t know enough about ballet to critically evaluate tonight’s performance so I can only speak for myself when I say I was truly captivated. It would seem I wasn’t the only one to feel that way either as the applause went on for what felt like hours (but was probably about 20-25 minutes!)

A great way to experience the tale of Sleeping Beauty.

It baffles the mind to think of just how much training these young monks have undertaken to bring us the two hour show that we were presented with tonight. The acrobatic skills, strength, and flexibility we saw tonight seemed almost out of this world – such was the ease that the monks and even their trainees (who were only up to 10 years old) displayed as they went through their martial arts and other acts.

Apart from the usual battles/combats with fists, feet, spears, swords, wooden poles etc. the monks also gave us the brick breaking on heads, bowl-stuck-on-stomach used to hold a monk aloft (see pic), lying in mid-air on the tips of four spears, two monks lying on beds of nails and then breaking bricks on their stomaches, walking on blades with heavy buckets of water, and even the breaking of metal with the groin (yowch!) acts. Sandra was a bit skeptical with some of the acts and I guess to some extent what the monks did took advantage of physics but I still think it was all pretty genuine.

If you like your kung fu you will have a great time. Don’t try it at home.

Oh if you’re wondering about this picture to the left Sandra wanted me to post it because she was totally amazed by the dude’s hair so if you’re expecting to see him at the next Shaolin Monks show you see – don’t have huge expectations! 🙂

Bent, a drama written by Martin Sherman, was first brought to the stage in 1979. Based on the testimony The Men with the Pink Triangles by concentration camp survivor Hans Heger it tells of the Nazi persecution of homosexuals. In 1979 this subject was new and unexplored and therefore raised a lot of eyebrows. 27 years later the play’s message is as relevant now as it ever has been.

Alan Cumming plays Max, a spoiled gay man working in a night club in Berlin in the 1930s. With boyfriend Rudy he is used to a life of excess. It is all torn away on the The Night of the Long Knives when Adolf Hitler made a move that would not only wipe out all his political rivals but was the beginning of the end for many, including Max and Rudy. Captured, tortured and forced to kill his boyfriend the true story is in the concentration camp where Max, who at first would rather pretend to be Jewish with a yellow star than a gay man with a pink triangle, eventually finds true love with fellow inmate Horst, played by newcomer Chris New, and also pride in who he is despite his surrounds.

The contrast between the decadant and almost light hearted first scenes of Max waking up after a hard night of partying, dressed in a flashy kimono wondering how he managed to get bruises on his bottom (perhaps it was from his storm trooper lover who spends the first scene butt-naked (!) chasing him around his lounge room), and the rest of the play was startling. You are taken immediately from a humorous beginning to knowing some of the true depravities of the Nazi regime. It is at once depressing and saddening to see.

So, it is not exactly a happy tale yet you are drawn into the drama. Admittedly there are moments in the play when it becomes too much and I lost my concentration but overall the quality of the writing and the acting was top notch so it wasn’t hard to get back into it.

At the end of the show we were treated to the privilege of having a Q&A session with Alan Cumming, Chris New, Martin Sherman, the writer, and Daniel Kramer, the director. I was amazing at how giving all of them where with their responses and they even extended the session when they saw how keen some of the audience members were. Alan Cumming especially was very gracious with his answers and, although he was fab in the play, I was probably most impressed by his performance during the Q&A.