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Showing posts with the label Matthew Kelly

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A night at the opera: That Bastard Puccini! (Park Theatre)

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It’s hard to imagine that it’s only been 130 years since Puccini first premiered La Boheme. Nowadays, it’s a revered classic, and guaranteed to be on any opera company's annual programme if it needs to stay afloat. It’s a crowd pleaser with its melodrama of poor, impoverished artists loving, starving and dying in Paris. But Puccini’s La Boheme had a less auspicious beginning, with one of his contemporaries accusing him of stealing his idea and being poorly received on its first outing. And that’s at the heart of That Bastard Puccini! Currently playing at Park Theatre , writer James Inverne uses the friendship and rivalry between the two composers, Puccini and Ruggero Leoncavallo, to weave a comic tale of creative frustration with an awful lot of facts and tidbits about the opera scene at the time. It’s part comedy, part music appreciation.  It opens with Leoncavallo (Alasdair Buchan) at home with his wife Berthe (Lisa-Anne Wood), cursing about Puccini’s latest work, which is drawn ...
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Delightful, delicious: The Box of Delights @Wiltonmusichall

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Wilton's Music Hall's production of The Box of Delights is a  delightful night of theatre that never ceases to amaze. A great ensemble and imaginative staging make this a must-see Christmas show. They've employed every theatrical trick to tell this Christmas adventure. There's puppetry, projections and people popping out of wardrobes. Adapted by Piers Torday from the 1935 novel by John Masefield, the story seems reminiscent given it involves a  mysterious box, the three friends on an adventure and an orphan boy. But while you'll be recalling stories by Tolkien and JK Rowling, the ingenuity of this adaptation is how it grabs your attention and never lets up. We're introduced to the hero Kay Harker (played by the heroic looking Alistair Toovey) as he's travelling home from school. He's visiting his guardian for Christmas. On the trip he meets a Punch and Judy man Cole (Matthew Kelly) and his dog Toby. He also has an encounter with a spooky looking ...
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Slick and oiled: Cinderella @NewWimbTheatre

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It is panto season, and nowhere has slicker productions than the New Wimbledon Theatre . This year, with Linda Grey as the fairy godmother in Cinderella the show has appeal for little kids and bigger kids. Bigger older kids. Ones who stayed in when Dallas was on television (well back then there probably wasn't much else to do). Cinderella now is set against the backdrop of her fathers struggling oil business and thanks her ugly stepsisters spending all his money, they are flat broke. Cue the need for a special Fairy Godmother - with a penchant for a hip flask - to come to the rescue and save the business and get Cinderella to meet her prince charming. While there is a star-studded cast, what also makes the show a treat are the charismatic performances by Liam Doyle as Prince Charming and Amy Lennox as Cinderella. They sing, dance hold their own with all the insanity (and occasional scene chewing) around them.
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