Musicals usually have a set format but this is not your traditional quirky heterosexual musical, but a hard core, full-on journey through one man's drug-fuelled sordid week in the eighties. Naturally big hair and big glasses abound, but with the everything eighties seemingly fashionable again it all seemed a natural fit in the surrounds of Hoxton and the East End. It was like spending a cool afternoon in your living room with a concept album that came to life. The cast were all great, particularly Paul Ayres as the lead, Jamie, and Jodie Jacobs as Vicky.
Watching it with Johnnyfox, he was less sure about to make of it. He was off that night to see the concert version of Company so I thought it might be helpful to make a comparison between the two shows as they are broadly similar. Just instead of:
Phone rings
Door chimes
In comes
Company
It was more like:
Lousy job
Wear shades
Snort coke
Eat pussy
There's something in that list we all can relate to. Catch it this month.
2 comments:
You have to bear in mind I hated 'Rent' and slept even through the coin-toss scene in 'Spring Awakening' so rock and sung-through musicals don't float my boat as readily as those with a book, lyrics and music you can hum on the way home.
Whilst appreciating the high production values (especially for this off-fringe venue), fine singing and intense choreography, I still felt BLBC rather plotless and static. But that's the material, not the production or performances.
Also the student next to me thought it wasn't very good value at £20 for 80 minutes, pro rata that's as expensive as Priscilla.
Ah well if you look hard enough there are good discounts on Lastminute and What's on stage... I think the latter has a £5 discount that makes it good value... Especially if you hate plot-based shows...
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