July 2010 - Reviews - London

Deanfan5
Ballet Girl
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by Deanfan5 »

Well as they say everything comes in threes. Firstly the lady who cleans the windows on the doors and the brass at VP took pity on me in the rain at 8.30am alone in the day queue and brought a chair out for me. God that made me feel old and guilty as I 'queened' it (in the nicest possible way) over all those that came after. Secondly I was given B14 and not A 10 as I expected (How does that work?). Thirdly today's Billy for the Matinee was Aaron who I had not seen for quite some time.
Now to the show.
Firstly dialectically Aaron is very strong and convincing. Maybe it is something about coming rom the East of England as George M excelled in that department as well as I recall. He also has a delightful way of creating stage intimacy especially with the ballet girls and Grandma. There is an uncomplicated sense of innocense with Aaron which allowes him to be quizzical and project that life with Michael, Debbie and that 'offer', and those strange ballet girls and their even stranger teacher, is at the end of the day all a bit of a puzzle that needs unravelling bit by bit as the the musical progresses. Clearly his pal Michael (a very dominant Jake today) wore the trousers (sorry dresses) and this Billy did allow himself to be bossed about a bit. Therein lies a little problem for me with Aaron. He is clearly a child who has been brought up very well and as such I do wonder if he ever gets under anyone's skin. The Billy in the film is a bit of a rough diamond that was able to give Dad and Tony some angst and for me the challenge for Aaron is to find that extra irritability and project it on stage in his acting. When he does, calling Dad a 'bastard' and the Angry Dance will become even more impactful. The gentle and very altrustic child (note all the good he has done for Great Ormond Street for example) needs to let his hair down more and be more of a 'pain in the proverbial' where Billy is concerned. Then the balance will be spot on. As to his overall performance it was very likeable and the Dream Sequence and Electricity were danced with considerable competence and skill. I think Aaron would agree that BTB was not as smooth as it could have been as all three had skipping issues. This element does rise and fall by clean skipping which puts a considerable onus on the performers. In the Letter at least all the items came out of the bag in the right order. (Ollie please note :lol:) However in that other Letter Aaron did manage to collapse on his bed a bit early so that the three adults were deprived of their leaps.
I still feel that for Aaron Billy is still 'work in progress' and I look forward to seeing him continually develop the role. The talent and potential is clearly there for all to see.
I continue to wish that when Deborah plays Gran she is given a total age makeover or perhaps is a little less lively than Ann or Romy.
It was good to speak to Phil S after the show and hear that he is going to play Mr B more regularly from the end of August.
Thanks Aaron for signing so many autographs after the show at Stage Door and clearly making so many people happy and also to his Mum for being so tolerant with us all.
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burtond
Michael
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by burtond »

Nice one Deanfan5
An ex-Regular and someone who was Passionate about the show but who has now found the rest of the WEST END.
KeefyM
Michael
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Joined: Mon Mar 29, 2010 8:16 pm

Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by KeefyM »

You will all be delighted to know that Keefy and his infamous long reviews are back (woo-ha-ha-ha – evil laugh).

Thursday 29th July 2010 - Evening. :D

Billy - Ollie
Michael - Joe
Debbie - Fleur

Hurrah! Ollie at last, first time I have seen him in a while (and the first time he was actually on when I was told he was on after being given the wrong schedule information a few times over the past couple of weeks and expecting it to be Ollie only for it not to be).

Decided earlier in the week with a BETM friend to go on Thursday evening but didn’t have tickets, phoned up Box Office and only the too expensive or rubbish seats left. Therefore decided to queue for day tickets.
Arrived at VP at 8.15am, first in queue Hurrah!. (Came out of Victoria Station at 8.10am and there were already 10-20 people in Wickeds day queue at that time – boo hiss). I have seen Wicked and it’s ok – clever for what it is but I certainly wouldn’t queue up for tickets even when the Box Office is open, never mind 2 hours before.

Anyway, so there I stood outside the VP at 8.15am with me Starbucks Latte, me breakfast sandwiches and me IPhone where I passed the time by writing lists & emails and had lovely chats with people who wondered when the Box Office opens, others who wondered what the restricted view meant, a French bloke who was annoyed that no pubs were open at 8.30 in the morning, the usual Big Issue seller with his dog who wandered up from outside Sainsburys down the road & a dustbin man.
Unfortunately no one else joined me in the queue until 9.45am – an hour an a half after I first arrived, and by that time Wicked’s day queue had about 50 people in it (boo-hiss) and there were only 8 of us in Billys queue when the Box Office opened at 10am.
Things were going well, first in queue & thinking to myself I will get middle aisle stalls tickets, hopefully it will be Ollie and it will be a great show tonight & looking forward to having a meal with friends before the show & a drink or ten afterwards.
At about 9.30am things started to go wrong, first of all a big red London Bus mounted the pavement outside the VP and about killed me after the bus got involved in an altercation with a white van and a bit of other traffic chaos.
Luckily the bus driver just managed to get off the pavement and control the bus & keep going, if he had lost control the bus would definitely have ended up in the foyer of the VP.
The bus driver and the white van man rather than stopping, just kept driving down the street & then decided to have a “lets see whose horn is the loudest” competition down the rest of Victoria Street.
Never mind, incident over, but then some bl!~dy women decided to stand in front of me in the queue (i.e. trying to skip to the front) until the lovely women next to me gave her what for(brilliant) and pointed out that “there is a queue love, and this gentleman and me are before you”. We are British – we queue in this country. (First time I have been called a gentleman in a while!).

Anyway, got the tickets I wanted for the evening (despite the box office initially offering me day seats for the matinee even though I made it perfectly clear I wanted the evening show). Got back to Vauxhall station to find trains delayed by an hour due to some breakdown earlier at old Clappy Junction. Got home eventually and looked forward to this evenings show. The things you do for Billy.

So onto the show, a great start with young Paddy Hewitt (perhaps a future Billy ?) as Small Boy brilliantly copying Billys moves and really going for it in his shouting of “Cush” at Billy. Another great performance of the Stars Look Down from all and another great Breakfast scene where again John Coates as Big Davy demolishes most of the baked bean and salt sandwich before he leaves the stage.
Love the way Ollie sits up on the bed when all the miners invade the Elliots kitchen making a racket and he looks down at them and silently tells them to F*** Off because of the noise as Billy wants to sleep/doesn’t want to get up. A great little touch from Ollie which you don’t always see if you are sitting too close in the first few rows to look up at Billy in his bed at the top of the stairs.

During the First Act there were signs of some of the past understated Ollie performances but very very little as he was superb throughout the show with the usual charisma & energy we expect from Ollie. He was hilarious and brilliant at trying to copy the Ballet Girls moves in Shine and in his reactions to Mrs Wilkinsons requests. He is now so comfortable in the role (and has been for a while) that he brings great extra little details to the character of Billy with great singing, dancing & acting throughout and of course his brilliant audience interaction with his infamous glances at the first few rows of the stalls.

My favourite Ollie scene is the Boxing Scene, all his other scenes are great but he has been the master of this scene for sometime and is definitely the best by far. As I have said before, Ollie should be the benchmark for all future Billys in how to act, box & dance in the Boxing scene. His Boxing moves are so spot on you think Billy is actually going to do some boxing. However when he starts dancing Ollie’s dance moves are just so brilliant and hilarious, that they convey perfectly the believability of how Billy hates Boxing and how he would rather dance. Ollie’s moves always have the audience roaring with laughter and you can never get tired of seeing them.
I get the impression that Ollie loves doing these funny dance moves as he really goes for it and looks like he is enjoying himself and probably would continue dancing if it wasn’t for the fact that George tells him to go back and hit Michael (of course Michael hits Billy first).
Absolutely love it, actually I wouldn’t mind if he spent the rest of the show doing these dance moves rather than Billy learning Ballet. I wonder if he can incorporate any of them into Electricity ?.
During Solidarity Ollie seemed to hurt his leg which botherhed him for most of the first act but as usual he carried on regardless and there were definitely no visible signs of any problems during his dances in the first act.

Joe was hilarious in Express and is developing into a great Michael with some unique lines and some cheeky glances (aka Jake Pratt) at the audience. I have to agree with Born to Boogie that Joe does get the balance right with the many sides to Michael. What makes Joes Michael even more endearing is his small size, especially against Ollie where little Joe seems to delight in ordering Ollie about the stage in Express. Another great partnership and the two of them were fantastic together in Express & the Winter scene.
At the moment all 3 Michaels are miles ahead of the Billys in getting the tap shoes on in Express. Come on Ollie, Dean, Rhys and Aaron all the Michaels are beating you hands down. The Michael Wins score will soon be getting much higher and off the scale compared to the Billy Wins score.
Although as Joe keeps telling all the Billys – “I’ve been practising & me mam(the shoes Billy puts on) has small feet”. (And in the context of the show I suppose Michael is “used to” dressing up in the shoes compared to Billy).
Again a few times this week Joe has done the “Call Me” to a few blokes rather than women – absolutely love it and so appropriate for Michael.

Fleur was fantastic as usual with perfect line delivery & dancing throughout. The loving way she looks at Billy in the Focussing On The Wall scene brilliantly conveys Debbie's “feelings” for Billy. Fleur and the Ballet Girls didn’t stand for any nonsense from Ollie’s Billy really pushing him all over the stage during Shine & Solidarity, I’m surprised Ollie didn’t get an injury from them here. Fleur’s facial expressions at Billy and the Ballet Girls are just brilliant and some of the best I have ever seen.
Great performances from Romy as Grandma and Sean Kingsley as Mr B (I wonder if he likes the skipping in B2B yet). Talking of B2B, Ollie yet again done the skipping perfectly although slower than usual which I don’t blame him for as the slight leg injury was probably bothering him and after being hit in the eye by the skipping rope a little while ago I don’t blame him for going slower.

One thing about Ollie is that he shows great maturity & professionalism in his attitude when things go wrong including when he sustains an injury. He is an absolute trooper & a star for continuing with his performances despite some injury that is bothering him. For example, his eye injury when he got hit by the skipping rope, it was clearly bothering him as he constantly rubbed it and by the time we came to the “Billy has an audition for the Royal Ballet School” scene his eye was constantly blinking and looked like he was in pain, but he still continued and done an amazing Angry Dance that night despite his eye bothering him. Bl!~dy skipping ropes. Does a Billy have to get permanently blinded for the rest of his life before the ropes are removed from the show ?.
I wonder what would have happened had Ollie sustained a serious eye injury that night!. Rumour has it that the Broadway version of Angry Dance is on its way – god help us.

The Second Act was definitely better than the first. The word that was being used at the Interval to describe the First Act was “flat” and it was, I don’t know why but it seemed there was a lack of enthusiasm from the cast in some scenes (or maybe it was just me feeling tired since I was up at 3am). Although Ollie, Joe, Fleur were great with another brilliant Angry Dance from Ollie, but not as Angry as usual or with as much cursing as usual (probably because of the slight injury to his leg from earlier on and also his Mum was in the audience so seemed to reduce the amount of swear words). He might not have been as Angry as usual but he did walk off the stage in the most really p***ed off mood I have seen by him or any other Billy. The look he gave the audience, was basically saying that it was all our fault things had gone wrong for Billy rather than his family’s fault.

To be honest the whole First Act seemed a bit understated which I can understand since the cast just finished the matinee only 2 hours earlier but it seemed to lack a “spark” and seemed to drag.
The show certainly picked up in the Second Act, it was like the entire cast needed the break at the Interval to waken up and bring the spark back into the show. They certainly did with a very lively Merry Christmas Maggie Thatcher which managed to get the whole theatre clapping along(eventually) and featured some great moments including Small Boy Paddy Hewitt brilliantly playing the Scythe as a guitar as usual, Joe Massey doing some brilliant dancing including a Michael Jackson moon walk, and Ollie interacting with the audience with his usual few glances at the first few rows & dancing in the background just before the song ends.

Ollie’s Dream Ballet was breathtaking with him constantly smiling throughout. A brilliant performance from Ollie & Barnaby with perfect chair spinning & perfect ballet moves - an absolute joy to watch which resulted in very appreciative applause afterwards.
Ollie’s Electricity – three words – Stunning, Stunning, Stunning. It was amazing which resulted in a very well deserved and long standing ovation which quite rightly went on forever & resulted in a massive smile across Ollie’s face with him standing there for ages looking at the audience. As much as I like both Ballet and Street Electricity’s it reminded just how great the Street Electricity’s are. Even though we have 3 Ballet Billys there are Street elements creeping into Rhys’ Electricity with Aaron also having the goal of developing more street/acro moves into his in the future. But it was great to see a pure Street Electricity again having not seen Ollie for a while.
It was phenomenal and great to hear the positive comments from the audience when leaving the VP and the great comments from his mum and her friends about his Electricity outside afterwards.

Great once again to have the opportunity to thank Ollie for a fantastic performance before he boarded the Billy Bus and it was lovely to meet & say hello to Ollie’s mum.
It is getting more difficult to explain just how good Ollie is, as I have wrote so many reviews in the past that I am running out of things to say. He is a great Billy who is performing at his peak and who gives the WOW factor everytime he is on stage.
He is so good now and has been for a long time that the problem is that words like, phenomenal, stunning, fantastic, brilliant etc will not be good enough to describe him by the time he finishes his run in Billy.

A fantastic evening with great performances by the young cast, Ollie certainly made it worthwhile standing outside the VP for just under 2 hours & I certainly would queue up again for 2 hours or longer to witness the talent of young Master Gardner and his brilliant performances. The role of Senior Billy is currently in great hands & hopefully will be for a long time yet.

Well Done Ollie, another brilliant performance. You are absolutely fantastic mate, yet again you demonstrated on Thursday night why you are one of the greatest ever Billys and will be remembered as one of the all time Billy legends.


Cheers
Keith
:D
KeefyM
Michael
Posts: 2130
Joined: Mon Mar 29, 2010 8:16 pm

Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by KeefyM »

Saturday 31st July 2010 - Evening : :D

Billy - Ollie
Michael - Connor
Debbie - Emily

A great show tonight led by young Master Gardner (& at least I had a ticket tonight & didn’t have to stand in the day queue as per Thursday).
Ollie was on top form as were the rest of the cast (although we about lost Emily’s Debbie as she was going a little bit too fast with her spins & she almost came flying off the stage – just before Tracey Atkinson almost does).
Ollie reviews are definitely getting more difficult to write as I'm running out of words to describe how good he is in every performance. Unlike Thursday night there were no signs of a slightly understated Ollie performance at times & instead we had a fantastic Billy performance with the usual Ollie charisma, energy, perfection & believability he brings to the role of Billy.

I will admit that at times some Ollie performances show signs of the understated performances from the past & some of his scenes are not as emotional as they perhaps could be i.e. his Letter is not I think as emotional as Tom Hollands or at the moment Deans, but so what, Ollie is a great Billy & is fantastic in every scene whether they are as emotional or not as previous/current Billys. He is of course the master of the Boxing Scene, a great job by the other 3 Billys & previous Billys but in my opinion no Billy has mastered how to do this scene as brilliantly as Ollie. I’m glad to say that tonight his dance moves in the Boxing Scene seemed to go on a bit longer than usual, Hurrah! even more please Ollie.

As I have said before we have 4 great Billys at the moment who all bring their own personality & uniqueness to the role and Ollie certainly does that in every performance with so much energy & enthusiasm throughout. Ollie has always interacted very well with both the adult & child cast & he conveys perfectly Billys emotions & naivety throughout his great performances. Of course it wouldn’t be an Ollie show without his brilliant glances at the audience & they were quite a lot tonight, with a few from Connor as well.

We go on about great & legendary Billys all the time but we should remember that there have been some legendary Michaels as well, & tonight Connor Kelly yet again demonstrated why he is one of the greatest ever Michaels & will go down as one of the all time Michael legends. A fantastic, hilarious & genius performance & a perfect partnership with Ollie. The two of them work so well together & it is fairly obvious that they are great friends both on & off the stage. Connor is a perfect partner for any of the Billys with his great acting, singing & dancing which convey perfectly Michaels emotions & many sides.
He is great with Dean, Rhys & Aaron but there is something special, something that just clicks when he is teamed up with Ollie & it just seems right – the perfect Billy/Michael combination & you believe the two of them are best friends from Easington.

Some great moments from Connor including a few extra camp walks & an extra bum wiggle as he walked backed to the mirror with the photo (one for the album), & that brilliant “pixie” walk he does over to the portable radio in the winter scene had the audience roaring with laughter. His most hilarious & brilliant moment tonight came when he was putting the Tutu on. He took absolutely ages to get it on, whether he was struggling with it or whether he was doing it deliberately slow for more comic effect it was brilliant, so much so that he even reduced Ollie to laughter who stopped himself pretty quickly to disguise the fact that he shouldn’t be laughing.

In Expressing Yourself, something different happened, something that hasn’t happened for a little while –
a Billy has finally beaten a Michael in getting the Tap Shoes on at last (don’t worry Connor I won’t tell Jake & Joe) – well done Ollie who was a good bit ahead of Connor, in-fact once they pushed the bedroom back in, Ollie came downstage & Connor was still centre stage adjusting the back of the shoe, which resulted in Ollie telling him to “hurry up” and a “I’m coming” from Connor.
At the beginning of Express I had to laugh as Connor really went for it in covering Ollie in the lipstick, which resulted in a rather cheeky smile from Connor & him almost bursting out laughing. A fantastic performance of Expressing Yourself from both with a few shouts of “wow” from the audience when they started tapping. For the first time in ages we also had the “lay off the fags“ line from Billy after Michael says ”me lungs are packing in”. Connor’s delivery of, “Huh, you should see what my underpants can do” resulted in great laughter & applause (the first time I have heard applause for this line) probably because Connor delivered it so clearly & perfectly. (and was about the only time the audience actually laughed during the First Act – see below).

In MCMT while all the cast are downstage & the Ballet Girls are singing about Michael Heseltine, Ollie & Connor were having a right carry on with one of the puppets & dancing about in the background with it, which seemed to result in a telling off from Phil Snowden. When they first entered through the swing doors it looked like the doors hit Connor badly as Ollie rushed through them first & the speed of the doors going back looked like they hit Connor, but it was done deliberately for comic effect & obviously planned.

A stunning Angry Dance from Ollie tonight & the really really Angry Dance that he has done in the past & was missing on Thursday night was back (including the swear words that were missing). Bloody Hell, he was absolutely fuming at the top of the stairs & the anger and redness in his face was unbelievable.
I thought he was going to kick the stairs to bits he was that Angry. Incredible tapping throughout with plenty of swearing, screaming & kicking the hell out of the riot shields. Again he walked off the stage in a really really pi**ed off manner as Thursday night with one hell of an angry look at us all in the Stalls. I do miss him telling the audience to F*** Off though when he walks off stage.

Another great performance of B2B by Genevieve, Sean & Ollie with perfect skipping by all 3, although Ollie was still a bit slower than he has done in the past with the skipping but still great. Genevieve’s initial boxing moves are great & seem to be getting more powerful & forceful that I’m worried she is actually going to hit Billy one of these days. Love how Ollie tells Mr B to “shutup” after Mr B says “you’re going to need something to dance to”, “you little w**ker”.

A few Billy forum members were in tonight & this is the first time they have seen the show since the changes, & like me initially, they didn’t take to the new B2B at all or the following Billy/Debbie toilet scene (which by the way, is still a bloody disjointed mess & still doesn’t make sense, and is only saved by Fleur, Francesca & Emily’s great performances. Emily is particularly hilarious here as she brilliantly stomps off loudly in the huff when Debbie is told to go outside by Mam.
However we have lived with this toilet scene for 2 months now so we will just have to put up with it (as no doubt we will have to put up with the Broadway Angry Dance when it comes- It wouldn’t surprise me that come Christmas the big red Billy Elliot sign outside the VP with the picture of George has been taken down & replaced with a sign that says Billy Elliot America – Live in London).

Anyway, back to the show. A great First Act spoiled by a rather lacklustre audience who failed to laugh at most of the jokes (I felt so sorry for poor Connor as some of Michaels funny lines did not get their usual laughter & neither did many of Billys lines & some of the adult casts lines. What the hell is wrong with these people ?, is it too much of an effort to laugh. I got the impression that there were obviously a few prudes in & they were offended by the language.

I said in my review on Thursday that the First Act was a bit flat as the cast seemed flat/couldn’t be bothered, well tonight it was the other way round the cast were fantastic, great performances from all & it was the audience who were flat. The audience in the First Act didn’t seem to appreciate any of it (apart from us forum members that were there of course). I felt like telling the audience to go & P*** Off to that witches nonsense across the road if they weren’t enjoying the show. (which reminds me, there is a poster on the Phone Box down the road from Billy about Wicked and it is basically a quote from Entertainment Weekly that says “Best Musical of The Decade”. All I have got to say is, Entertainment Weekly you haven’t got a freekin clue what you are talking about).

Obviously the audience needed the Interval & a few drinks to warm up or maybe they changed the entire audience during the Interval when I wasn’t looking because the response from MCMT to the Finale was great. Laughter in the right places & many appreciative shouts & applause for Connor in the Winter Scene & for Ollie and his great Dream Ballet, Electricity & Finale performances.

Merry Christmas Maggie Thatcher was as lively as usual & the audience started clapping along immediately & continued clapping right the way through the song. Another great performance of Deep Into The Ground from Joe Caffrey which resulted in Small Boy Charlie Salsen doing what other Small Boy Aaron Lynch does – singing silently along to every word.

A brilliant Dream Ballet from Ollie & Barnaby and another perfect performance from both, I thought tonight was even better than Thursday as the timing of the ballet moves i.e. in sync with & without the chairs was much better. We had the usual serious/concentration face from Ollie while spinning the chair then the constantly smiley Ollie once he gets rid of it. I’m glad to report the girls from Belarus sitting next to me managed to work out who Barnaby is meant to be & what the scene is meant to be. A great Dream Ballet spoiled by the moron who’s mobile phone went off just as Billy comes towards Dad. As James Foster's Ballet Dancer would say, “Prick”.

Isaac Gryns Posh Boy is brilliant, he comes on as such a snooty little brat that it is no wonder Billy looks at him with such disgust. Some Posh Boys in the past have acknowledged or smiled at Billy, but Isaac’s Posh Boy completely ignores Billy in such a brilliant way that it generates a really great look from Ollie (and Dean) that basically tells the audience that Billy is thinking “I hate you already you snotty little weirdo”.

Another brilliant Street Electricity from Ollie starting off with his usual hands free summersault (& almost a heart attack for me as his head just missed the floor) & then his great energetic combination of street/ballet/acro moves all over the stage with the usual board flip at the end which resulted in a Wow from the girl sitting next to me & great applause with Ollie smiling away for a good while. Unfortunately he didn’t get a standing ovation tonight as on Thursday but with my comments about the audience earlier it was not a surprise. In all honesty, it was a great Electricity as stunning as it was on Thursday but not better than Thursdays, it was again a brilliant reminder of how great the Street Electricity’s are & how great Ollie’s Electricity is.

In the opening The Royal Ballet School Letter scene, Ollie took the lid of the biscuit tin & dropped it and it went clanging to the floor. I had to laugh as it resulted in a great big p***ed off sigh from Ollie, but he picked it up & carried on as usual. Ollie has lost his crown as Mr Unique with the Biscuit Tin as all four Billys now do something different with it, including Rhys eating two whole biscuits - firstly when he opens the tin, & when he goes back to it later he takes another biscuit out & eats it while he is putting the lid back on.

William Elliot is Queer/Esquire got the biggest laugh of the night, unfortunately the girls from Belarus sitting next to me despite understanding the show well/the Geordie pronunciations etc didn’t get the Esquire/Queer thing at all. But hey-ho at least the audience were laughing
(unlike the First Act).

Again the audience did the right thing & didn’t clap until the curtain was almost all the way down with a very devastated & emotional Connor sitting on the bike staring at Billy leaving. The cast didn’t get a standing ovation until the very last moment i.e. after Ollie did his solo summersaults & all the cast come running back on.

It was a great show with brilliant performances by all the young cast & by the main adult cast, in particular the usual fantastic performances from “Billys family” Craig Gallivan as Tony, Joe Caffrey as Dad & the legend that is Ann Emery as Grandma who seemed to be even more cheekier & funnier than usual, reducing Ollie to fits of laughter at various points during Grandmas Song. A great performance by Genevieve again & she does a brilliant little touch in The Letter - When Billy tells her it is from his mam & Mrs W realises it is private to him, rather than continuing to the chair to read it she puts it back in the envelope & walks back to Billy to hand it back to him. Only when Billy tells her to read it does she take it back out of the envelope & then makes her way across to the chair to read it.

Phil Snowden has been great with his unique take on George over the last week & he really gives Billy, Michael, Tall Boy & Small Boy a hard time in the Boxing scene. He is hilarious & really goes for it dressed as Maggie in MCMT & I have noticed that he always gives Michael a row & tells him to sit down (behind Billy) when Michael attempts to sit next to Billy just when Dad starts singing Deep Into The Ground.
I have said it before, is there any role Phil Snowden cant play?. Surely the next time we are down to one Billy due to illness or injury, rather than making Ollie, Dean, Rhys & Aaron do six shows a week, surely Phil could play Billy ?.

It was great to meet up with a few Billy forum members who I haven’t seen for a while & have a catch up and hear their opinion on the changes to the show. Sorry I didn’t catch you at the end before we left.

Despite a lacklustre & unresponsive audience in the First Act it was a great show, with great performances from all especially Ollie, Connor & Emily. Once again young Master Gardner proved what a great Billy he is & what a talent he has. Another charismatic, energetic & fantastic performance from our Senior Billy. Well done Ollie, bloody brilliant mate!.

Great Reviews Pat, Barry, Born to Boogie, Thomas, Athina & Deanfan5 - keep 'em coming folks!.

And Deanfan5, just to let you know, Ollie did bring the items out of Billys bag in the correct order tonight & as for those illustrious characters in A9 and A10 on Thursday night, I can’t for the love of me think who you are talking about.

Cheers
Keith
:D
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porschesrule
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by porschesrule »

Whew! I'm as exhausted as the Billys must be after a 3 hr show after reading your two reviews Keith. :lol:

But brilliant and gems of detail as always. Reading them is as close to actually being at the show as one can get.

Thanks.
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burtond
Michael
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by burtond »

Really love the reivews Keith. Love the detail. Love the emotion. As has been said by other, the comprehensive approach you take allows us to be spiritually at the show with you. Keep 'em coming man.
An ex-Regular and someone who was Passionate about the show but who has now found the rest of the WEST END.
Barry Appleby
George
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by Barry Appleby »

Hi
Thanks for the great reviews Keith, reading them just makes me feel as though I was there, not 220 miles away. Glad to hear the audience got off their a--, no!! I'll behave myself, backsides eventually, for all the cast's sake.

Barry
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athadj
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by athadj »

Hey Keith thanks for taking the time to write the reviews. They were brilliant as always!
So sorry to have missed Ollie when I was there last week. (Not that there was anything wrong with the performances I got of course...)
Looking forward to reading more of yours and everyone else's reviews as it's the closest thing to actually being at the VP.
Athina

London
Liam x 1, Ollie x 4, Dean x 11, Rhys x 8, Aaron x 4, Scott x 9, Josh x 10, Ryan x 10, Adam x 6, Kaine x 7, Harris x 6, Harrison x 2
New York
Peter x 1
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pinknick103
Tony
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Location: Hertfordshire

Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by pinknick103 »

Excellent review Keith. What a great writer you are. Hope to see you soon, plus of course lotsa other forum members
lov Nic xxx
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Todd
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Re: July 2010 - Reviews - London

Post by Todd »

KeefyM wrote:It wouldn’t surprise me that come Christmas the big red Billy Elliot sign outside the VP with the picture of George has been taken down & replaced with a sign that says Billy Elliot America – Live in London).
And if we Yanks have anymore to say about it, get ready for the new song at the beginning of Act 2: "Merry Christmas Ronald Reagan" done in a cowboy/country-western twang ! :lol:

Seriously though, I don't imagine many in the audience will realize that the new changed scenes they're seeing were originally done on Broadway or Chicago, and then changed for the London show. It's not like they're removing British expressions or names and replacing them with American-culture expressions.

I imagine if the reverse would have happened and the show would have opened originally on Broadway and then moved to London a few years later, it would be the Broadway show that would now be having changes made to it. They would have had the chance to try new things in the later incarnations of the show and if they thought it made the show better, then make those same changes in the original location where the show was playing.
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