Book: Dennis Kelly Music & Lyrics: Tim Minchin Director: Matthew Warchus Reviewer: Lauren Humphreys With its origins as the Royal Shakespeare Company’s 2010 festive show, nine years down the line, Dennis Kelly and Tim Minchin’s musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s Matilda has been seen by over eight million people around the globe. Winning awards and smashing box office records wherever ...
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Writer: Mark Haddigan Director & Choreographer: Racky Plews Reviewer: Dominic Corr We all know the song, and love it or hate it, we can all at least sing that one single verse. Sir Cliff Richards’ (and The Shadows’) 1963 triumph Summer Holiday – taken from the titular film, is still a British classic. The musical, adapted from the film, sees four London ...
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Book and Lyrics: David Lindsay-Abaire Music: Jeanine Tesori Tour Director: Nigel Harman Reviewer: Gareth Davies They may be tales as old as time, but in 2001 Shrek gave traditional fairy stories a post-modern makeover, turning inwards the conventions of happily ever after, and giving their characters a few sly twists. The film won a Best Animation Oscar, and DreamWorks had ...
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Writer: Eleanor Bergstein Director: Federico Bellone Choreographer: Gillian Bruce Reviewer: Dominic Corr Dirty Dancing, the hip gyrating classic of the eighties is yet another adaptation to transfer from the silver screen to the theatrical stage. With a successful run in the West End and an already fiercely loyal fan base, is there enough content within this touring production to tide ...
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Book: Gregory Boyd (from the works of Lewis Caroll) Music: Frank Wildhorn Director: Lotte Wakeham Reviewer: Dominic Corr It isn’t often that Scotland is privy to the grand European première of a musical. Frank Wildhorn’s Wonderland is doing just this, arriving into the Edinburgh Playhouse prior to touring the UK. Plummeting down the rabbit hole, or rather the elevator shaft of ...
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Music and Lyrics: John Kander and Fred Ebb Director: Walter Bobbie Reviewer: Gareth Davies Little excites the popular press as much as a criminal trial with a celebrity defendant, and Kander and Ebb’s musical satire on the interplay between crime and punishment, and fame and fortune remains an almost flawless theatrical package, with both wit and insightful analysis of the ...
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Book: Thomas Meehan Music: Charles Strouse Lyrics: Martin Charnin Director: Nikolai Foster Reviewer: Dominic Corr For just shy of forty years, Annie has often proven to be one of the most popular and sickeningly sweet musicals ever to grace the stage. This new production, however, manages to downplay the sugar and generate some genuine chemistry between its characters. The plot ...
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Musical Director: John Maher Reviewer: Fraser MacDonald Billed as “A celebration of the music of The Beatles”, Let It Be is packed with the hits of the Fab Four but struggles to live up to their incredibly high standard. The curtain rises to reveal a virtual Cavern Club projected on the vast Playhouse stage, complete with the four Liverpool lads ...
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