Diamond Head Reviews

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CJ-Rochester
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Diamond Head Reviews

Post by CJ-Rochester »

Here's a glowing review from the Sept 25 edition of Star Advertiser. Unfortunately a subscription is required to read it, I will just paste the excerpt:
Aaron Ostroff Magee, 14, makes a remarkable and stunning stage debut as a leaping wizard of ballet in “Billy Elliot the Musical,” the theatrical hit that tackles familial and work-related conflicts, emotions, ethics and choices.
http://www.staradvertiser.com/2016/09/2 ... t-dazzles/
skkmercury
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Re: Diamond Head Reviews

Post by skkmercury »

I'll be in Hawaii during the final week of the run and have tickets for two of the shows. One of my favorite musicals in one of my favorite places on earth - I can hardly wait! I promise to provide a full review here :D
skkmercury
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Re: Diamond Head Reviews

Post by skkmercury »

Sunday, October 9th

Aaron/Andrew/Stephanie/Ryder

Well, this turned into a much longer review than I had planned, but what the heck….

Within a very nicely done Playbill style program, a page devoted to “Director’s Notes” is included. John Rampage wrote about seeing the 2000 film, Billy Elliot and being emotionally blown away. Subsequently, he was again blown away after a Diamond Head Theatre (DHT) group took a trip to New York where they were fortunate enough to get tickets to the last preview before the opening of BETM on Broadway. John said he went back three more times and always left in tears. He went on to say, “The biggest challenge in bringing BETM to the DHT stage was finding a young man to play Billy Elliot. Luckily, back in November 2015, I found Aaron Ostroff. With extensive ballet and acrobatic training, but no theatre, vocal or tap background, he started preparing for the role with coaching [from a couple of local teachers]. Aaron has worked tirelessly on preparing for his role, and I think you will be amazed at his performance.”

After seeing the DHT production this afternoon, I can say I’m pretty amazed with the entire production. I wasn’t sure what to expect since this is community theatre where there’s very little budget to produce shows. But, there must be tremendous support from theatre sponsors and from hundreds of volunteers because the folks at the self-named “Broadway of the Pacific” put on a very ambitious show! All of the sets, costumes, lighting & sound designs, etc. are all home grown and top notch. Equally impressive is the live orchestra of eight. The theater itself is a cool, intimate space with 472 seats. When the curtain is closed, the stage appears to be small, but when revealed it’s actually quite deep and fairly wide. There isn’t much heighth though, making drops and the like impossible. From what I can tell, all of the actors are local residents who have only local experience. None of the actors is a member of Actors Equity.

Overall, the cast is really very good. I was very impressed by the quality of acting, singing and dancing by all of the named characters. Ahnya Chang is a true triple-threat and plays a terrific Mrs. Wilkinson. LeGrand Tolo Lawrence as Dad perhaps had the best acting chops on the stage and also possesses a very nice set of singing pipes. Loved his portrayal. Lisa Konove as Grandma is another standout and nailed ‘We’d Go Dancin’. Tony is played by Chance Ingalls who is just a freshman in college. He’s a terrific Tony and a great age to play Billy’s older brother. Fedrico Biven as George is very funny in the role and is a fantastic Maggie Thatcher!

There are a lot of kids in this show. Ten ballet girls, plus five boys where Tall Boy & Posh Boy are played by separate kids. The ballet girls are all terrific. Funny and obviously having a blast. Debbie, played by Stephanie Zaharis, is a talented dancer and actor with the comic timing and delivery of someone who has much more experience than her bio indicates.

I saw Andrew Bell as Michael, and he was an absolute delight. So funny, such a good tap dancer and the kid could really sing! He was one of my favorite performers on the day. But, I was really disappointed the director didn’t have Michael eat up the audience following Expressing Yourself. He ran off stage at the same time Billy and all of the big dresses (as well as the big pair of pants) ran off.

And then there’s Billy: Aaron Ostroff. I’ve read that he just recently turned 14, but I think he could easily pass for 11 or 12, right around Billy’s age. It’s obvious off the bat that Aaron can dance! During Billy’s part of ‘The Stars Look Down’, his movements while singing “Take Me Up, etc….” are very dance like and suggests he perhaps had an interest in dance long before stumbling into Mrs. W’s ballet class. Very interesting choreography & directorial choice here. I liked it a lot. Further, during ‘Shine’, Billy is a much more willing participant towards the end of the number than I’ve ever seen in any production. He seems to be enjoying himself and seems to recognize he’s pretty good at this stuff. This was the second of three interesting takes on this theme I really liked. The third and best is when he does shadow puppets after being left alone in the gym. He doesn’t do that here. In dim lighting, Billy attempts a few ballet moves including hesitantly setting himself in a position to do a pirouette but doesn’t complete it. Early on, it’s clear dancing tickles his fancy.

Aaron’s performance throughout the show makes it super clear he is an accomplished and really fine dancer. It’s also clear he’s just learning the craft of acting and singing. I pretty much know Billy’s lines inside and out, so I think I’m being very accurate when I say I don’t think Aaron missed a single word or queue nor did he stumble or mumble at all. Quite impressive. With continued work on his timing and delivery of lines, Aaron’s acting and singing will just get better and better. One scene he just nailed is ‘Dear Billy’. When his singing of the letter trails off, he becomes distraught and emotional but not so much so that it’s overdone. I thought he was pretty brilliant and really moved the audience in this scene.

Unfortunately, I was pretty disappointed and underwhelmed by the choreography and directorial choices of ‘Angry Dance’ and ‘Electricity’. Now maybe in a typical community theatre production, these numbers staged as is would be great. But, the staging of this show as a whole is otherwise fantastic, and with a stellar dancer of Aaron’s talent, I’m not sure why two of the biggest dance numbers in the show ended up leaving a lot to be desired. It seemed to me that the talent was there to duplicate what’s been seen in the major productions of the show, but for whatever reason, decisions were made to change it up a lot and not make these numbers as interesting or exciting. ‘Born To Boogie’ and ‘Dream Ballet’ were spectacular, in some ways even better than the original versions. More on that in a minute. I just didn’t get how the creatives here seem to outdo themselves with some numbers but fell really short on others. ‘Angry Dance’ was pretty uninspiring and included some bizarre dance moves. The number ended with Billy’s back to the audience and then fell to his knees and then bent backwards in an odd kind of modern dance move. It was strange and felt totally out of place. ‘Electricity’ started out great and followed closely to the original choreography. But, it soon swayed and again turned into a lackluster number. The big finale to the number wasn’t bad and included some great acrobatics like a back flip and back handspring. There were no pirouettes! I suppose that’s okay in a “street” Electricity, but this wasn’t at all that. In an otherwise great production, my favorite segment in the show turned out to be pretty disappointing because Aaron wasn’t given near enough material here to show off his ballet talent. The crowd seemed to love it, but I imagine most may not know any other version to compare against.

‘Born To Boogie’ was a huge highlight and brought the crowd to big cheers. It included having Billy do a full splits and later a tumbling pass similar to the floor exercise in gymnastics. It was awesome. There was even an extended jump roping segment where Aaron again brought the crowd to huge applause in the middle of the number. It ended with Aaron doing a cartwheel and then collapsing out of exhaustion. This number easily got the biggest ovation of the first act.

The highlight of the second act was easily the Dream Ballet. First off, the synchronization with older Billy was amazing. I honestly don’t recall ever seeing it so spot on. The choreography was a brilliant mix of the original version and some terrific new moves. An absolutely breathtaking move included having Billy stage right and older Billy stage left. Billy runs toward his older self and launches himself upward like Superman taking off for the sky. Older Billy catches him down low at the hips and then raises him high into the air where Billy strikes a beautiful pose as though he’s in flight. The crowd, including myself, was awestruck and erupted into raucous applause. I had thought this might be the extent of any flying, but after a few other really cool moves, I see a wire come down toward the back of the stage. They executed the flying sequence very admirably, and again the house erupted into cheers as Billy spun up to the rafters, similar to the original choreography.

The show finale was also really well done, perhaps as good or slightly better than the original version. Everyone could really tap well, and it was impressive to see such a large cast executing the same moves in unison. Witnessing this really felt like being at a big theater with a big budget cast, so knowing that it’s community theatre just made the experience extra special.

A couple of final notes: The “Director’s Notes” indicated that the language for this production has been toned down but not eliminated in order to preserve the grit and feeling of the working class mining community of 1984. Well, I’m not sure what he meant in regards to “toning down”, unless he’s comparing against the London production which definitely had the most foul language. I was paying close attention, and the DHT production exactly matched the Broadway version as far as foul language goes, except for one instance. Mrs. Wilkinson says to Billy, “you’re very, VERY special” instead of the usual version. The Director also mentioned that the Geordie accent has been softened so as to help the audience understand the words. That was definitely true. No problem at all understanding everyone. Many did adopt a pretty good accent, just not an authentic one.

If there are any questions about how this production handled this or that, I’d be happy to discuss.

Also, I’m reposting the link that CJ-Rochester posted in another thread. There are 30 pics from this production on the DHT Facebook page.

https://www.facebook.com/DHTheatre/phot ... 6307153390

Lastly, I thought something from a cast member’s bio really nailed the spirit of BETM:
“While this role can be humorous, Mati hopes that the audience will remember the important message of acceptance and being yourself!” – Matias Durkin who alternates in the role of Michael
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