West End Live Quick Update

West End Live, has grown in just three years to become the world’s largest free theatre festival, taking over the whole of Leicester Square for one weekend, this year from 11am to 6pm on Saturday 20 June and from noon to 6pm on Sunday 21 June.

Amongst the performers from West End shows the crowd of more than 150,000 expected visitors will be entertained by Jerry Springer from Chicago and Jodie Prenger from Oliver
Latest confirmed shows according to the official web site include:
Avenue Q,
Been So Long,
La Cage Aux Folles,
Carousel,
Chicago,
Dirty Dancing,
Hairspray,
Jersey Boys,
Oliver!,
Priscilla Queen of The Desert,
Sister Act,
Stomp,
Thriller Live,
Too Close To The Sun,
We Will Rock You,
Wicked

OOh I can’t wait! It was great last year but this looks even better!
Be there:
Leicester Square on the weekend of the 20th and 21st of June 2009!

Other Performers include:

• The Tom Tom Crew
• Salsateca
• Little Big Club
• Noise Ensemble
• London Gay Men’s Chorus
• The Players Theatre

Sideshow Exhibitors include:

• Postman Pat and Jess,
• Bob The Builder/Angelina Ballerina and Barney,
• Little Angel Puppet Theatre,
• Greasepaint,
• BFI,
• Forbidden Planet,
• Cartoon Museum,
• Science Museum,
• Royal Historic Palaces,
• Ripley’s Believe it or Not Odditorium,
• Victoria Albert Museum
• Chinatown showcase

All on Saturday 20 June and Sunday 21 June 2009.

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Carousel Reviews

The newspaper critics reviews for Carousel at the Savoy Theatre are in and mostly they are fairly positive. Lesley Garrett comes in for a bit of criticism for her performance but apart from that I think they had a good time.

Benedict Nightingale in The Times at first felt the production suffered by comparison with the revival at the National 10 years ago but eventually warmed to it:

Yet gradually I thawed, as caught up in Hammerstein’s book as I was captivated by maybe the finest score even Rodgers ever produced. Yes, the show was overmiked, meaning that some songs sounded shrill. Yes, the artlessly cheerful millgirls who form half the chorus swirled about to annoyingly cute effect. Yes there wasn’t enough gravity in that wonderfully subjunctive love song, ‘If I Loved You’, and, yes, that meant that Alexandra Silber and Jeremiah James were failing to displace Joanna Riding and Michael Hayden on my mental hard disk. But by the famous ballet at the end I was won over once again.”

Michael Billington in the Guardian isn’t that keen on the show, never mind this production:

“How good is Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel? … Personally, I’ve always thought it a flawed masterwork; and so it proves once again in Lindsay Posner’s well-sung revival which holds one’s attention until the death of the hero, Billy Bigelow, after which the show ascends into the empyrean and the realms of pseudo-art “

Nicholas de Jongh in the Evening Standard was enchanted by the production but not too keen on Lesley Garret’s “gross, music hall Nettie”

“Despite Lindsay Posner’s old-fashioned production I was enchanted by Rodgers and Hammerstein’s bitter-sweet musical fantasy about missed life-chances in a 1870s New England village … That wonderful designer, William Dudley, initially summons up a fairground carousel that looks unprettily low-rent……. Dudley’s vivid back-projections offer ocean views, ships sailing and, with thrilling illusionary deftness, the spectacle of Billy ascending to heaven’s ‘back-yard’

Charles Spencer in the Daily Telegraph is more impressed and even names Carousel as “one of the greatest of all musicals”

“Most of the principals may not be famous names, but they bring real sincerity and freshness to their roles. Better yet, the cramped stage means that the show often seems to explode with vitality. In that great song of renewal and seething sexuality, ‘June is Bustin’ Out All Over’, Adam Cooper’s choreography sets the stage alight with high-kicks, dangerous lifts and a testosterone-charged athleticism that is thrilling. Of course, there will always be some who dismiss Carousel as gluttonously sentimental. It is not to everyone’s tastes … By the end of the show, with many in the audience audibly sniffing back the tears, it is clear that justice has been done to one of the greatest of all musicals.”

Ian Shuttleworth in the Financial Times enjoyed the show but felt the production ignored the darker side of Carousel.

I left the Savoy Theatre with hope in my heart, as the song exhorts, uplifted and unashamed at my immersion in the sentimentality of Lindsay Posner’s production. Only later did I remember that, to achieve this result, he has had to sell the pass on virtually every shadow in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical.

Yes, songs such as “If I Loved You” and the roustabout Billy Bigelow’s “Soliloquy” are heartbreaking in their yearning, and “June Is Bustin’ Out All Over” is an irresistible paean to going forth and multiplying. But, as Alastair Macaulay noted on this page on the show’s last major British revival in 2006 at Chichester, the narrative elements include “unemployment and conventional ideas of feminine decency… male violence to women, excessive gambling and finally a one-parent family”. All of which, in the moment (well, the three hours), manage to glide by insubstantially.

So there you are, mostly they enjoyed Carousel. I’d love to do a round up of blog reviews at this point but there really haven’t been any yet!

Of course, if you’ve been to see Carousel at the Savoy you are welcome to add your opinions here.

** Book Carousel Theatre Breaks **

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Carousel will play at the Savoy Theatre. Previews 22nd November. Opens 2 Dec 2008, booking to 25 July 2009, Starring:

Jeremiah James (Billy Bigelow)

Lesley Garrett (Nettie),

Alexandra Silber (Julie Jordan).

** Book Carousel Theatre Breaks **

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Carousel tour then West End

After a short UK tour, 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein classic Carousel is coming to London’s West End. The show is to start a short UK tour in September prior to a London transfer (venue and exact dates to be confirmed) in November. Possible venues include the Savoy, if Never Forget transfers.

** Book Carousel Theatre Breaks **

Lesley Garrett

Lesley Garrett, well known for both for her TV and stage appearances, will play Julie’s cousin Nettie Fowler . She came to prominence on the West End stage with her portrayal of the Abbess in that other Rogers and Hammerstien classic, The Sound of Music. Carousel will give Ms Garrett the opportunity to sing another Rogers and Hammerstien show stopping anthem, “You’ll Never Walk Alone”.

The story of Carousel

Carousel mixes fantasy and reality . The story is set in New England and tells the tragic tale of carousel barker Billy Bigelow and mill worker Julie Jordan. The story follows the fate of the two main couples, one working class (Billy and Julie) and one mostly middle class (Enoch and Carrie) and and their children.

Billy spends much of the second half of the show as an invisible ghost, watching over his daughter as she goes through her painful teenage years.

Premiered on Broadway in 1945, Carousel was made into a Hollywood film, starring Shirley Jones and Gordon McRae, in 1956. (On a personal note I watched this several times on TV as a teenager and cried buckets!)

Its last major London production was at the National Theatre in 1992

Songs from Carousel

Full of classic songs Carousel has many good tunes that we all know and love including:

You’re a Queer One, Julie Jordan

Mister Snow

June Is Bustin’ Out All Over

When the Children Are Asleep

If I loved You

And of course:

You’ll Never Walk Alone

** Book Carousel Theatre Breaks **

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