Castle Players 
The Village Hall, Lytchett Matravers 
Caroline Burr 
22 May 2025
Castle Players provided a fabulous evening’s entertainment with their show Journeys last night. The title comes from the inclusion of songs from 15 different musicals – some from the top of the show, some from the end of an act or sometimes from a pivotal moment within the show. Also included were poem and sketches. This gave everyone a chance to shine – and they did!
Becki Dawson did an excellent job as Director. Co-ordinating such a complex programme is not an easy task, but quick costume changes and slick entrances and exits made for a show which flowed well from one number to the next. I must also mention that she has the most amazing voice, which I honestly think would not be out of place on a West End stage. Her solos were outstanding, and she worked particularly well with Lucie Harding in the duets, such as ‘Defying Gravity’ from Wicked, where the harmonies were lovely.
I was pleasantly surprised that the group have so many talented singers and would urge them to take on a full-blown musical in the future. Amongst the other stand out performances were Lou Donovan who gave us ‘All That Jazz’ from Chicago and was very funny as Madame Thenardier from Les Misérables. She was well paired with Phil McMullen as the grasping innkeeper singing ‘Master of the House’. Mollie Burden mastered a difficult song from Hamilton very effectively and Simon Langford was convincing with his rendition of the jazz ballad ‘Feeling Good’, which was a brave choice considering there is a famous version by Michael Bublé. I would just have liked him to stand still, as I found his movement (due to nerves?) a bit distracting.
Naomi Butchart gave us ‘Astonishing’ from Little Women and Kim Burden-Thompson sang ‘Don’t Rain On My Parade’. They are both very talented performers, with a powerful voices and stage presence.
The tunes sung by the whole cast were delightful, such as ‘Anthem’ from Chess, ‘Hello’ from Book Of Mormon and ‘One Day More’, so the musical Director Steve O’Neill is to be congratulated. However, I felt that the show might have been better to finish on this emotive song from Les Misérables rather than go into ‘Time Warp’ (Rocky Horror Picture Show) as the last song. This was not in the programme, so perhaps was a late addition, and if you are a man wearing stockings and suspenders you got to really go for it. It needs to be enthusiastic and risqué!
Monologues and poems were well delivered by the very experienced Veronica Ryder, the young Ella Burden – quite a talented family here I think, Val Holland and others. This gave variety to the evening, but I felt that some worked better than others.
If I were being very fussy, I would say that the sound was rather loud, including the house music and the smoke machine tended to be overused. That aside my companion and I had a very enjoyable evening and came away humming some of the tunes – always a good sign! It is difficult to mention all the highlights from the evening, but there were a lot of them! It was just a shame the audience was small, but if you get a chance to go along tonight or tomorrow, I can promise you a cracking evening.
