Its Show Time

I have had the amazing good luck to have seen three very different shows in the past two weeks. While I was in Barcelona Rebecca and I saw a rather mediocre amateur production of Private Eyes by Stephen Dietz. The show was too confusing to be straightforward and not confusing enough to be really interesting. The actors were all sort of half hearted, the set was boring and the show was miss represented through its advertising. All in all it was a total disappointment. Enough of that.

Back in London a bunch of us went out for a friends birthday with the aim of seeing a West End Musical. After comparing ticket prices and peoples preferences we settled on .... wait for it... Ghost, the Musical. Yes, Ghost, pottery wheel and all. Interesting. Now I must admit I have never actually seen the movie, and to be honest I don't feel a pressing urge to go out and watch it even now.  The show itself was interesting. The scenography was incredible. I mean, really really cool design. A lot of fantastic stage effects. People walking through walls, disappearing, things flying through the air. All done flawlessly. Beautiful. The scenery was all big video screens. And there were a lot of neon colors and video clips playing simultaneously with the onstage action. Fascinating and compelling, but totally overwhelming. The poor ensemble. Any time they would come on for a number the screens would go crazy and no one would pay attention to the people.  The show itself is not great. The music is generic and totally forgettable. The actors were so over amplified that you couldn't understand them. And the story line is trite. So if you are interested in the design (which is worth seeing) go see the show. If you want to see a good show, don't go see Ghost.

Then this past weekend a few of us got together to see the West End production of Crazy For You. This was absolutely lovely. They didn't do anything crazy with it.  The choreography and dancing were wonderful. The ensemble were distinctive and fun to watch. The whole thing was just perfect. The show itself is a bit dated, and it was interesting to see such an American show played here. There were several bits and jokes that didn't work simply because the audience was primarily English. For example the whole song about being English (Chin up, carry on old chum etc etc) really didn't work at all. But on the whole it was simple, and lovely. The kind of show that you cant help but feel great after watching. I wasn't hugely fond of the leading lady, but not to the point where it detracted from the overall experience.

One of the interesting things I noticed about the west end shows was the quality of everyone's American accents. Basically, atrocious. Especially in Ghost. Everyone was going for the sort of New York/New Jersey cop awfulness. It was not pretty. The two leads were fine, although I have yet to check their bios to see if they are actually American. That was the case with Crazy For You, the lead guy (who was wonderful by the way) had a bio that featured mostly work in New York. The girl, who's southern accent was lacking, was not. This I find this quite encouraging, as I do have an actual American accent. Hopefully it will work in my favor!