From the beginning the atmosphere in the room was electric, everyone was eager with anticipation as to what was coming. We were not disappointed. The opening number ‘There’s No Business Like Showbusiness’ set the scene for a most enjoyable evening full of lively entertainment and laughter.
The powerful voice of Anne-Marie was first on. She delivers a song with great feeling, her duet with Martin was fun to listen to with excellent timing. Martin is always exciting to watch, you never quite know what expressions he is going to display. However, for me, Anne-Marie’s rendition of ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina’ was emotional and made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up! Lizzie too has a very powerful voice and is lovely to watch, the Barbra Streisand number could have been Barbra singing, but I particularly liked ‘Kindergarten Boyfriend’ as it was only last week I was at Heathers. Evie’s numbers were all good, especially ‘What I Did For Love’ from A Chorus Line, but equally so I enjoyed ‘Waiting For Life’, a song I was not familiar with. ‘With You’ from Ghost was performed by Francesca, a very difficult song to sing but I felt she did it justice, as well as ‘Speed Test’ with Alan, a great duet, I loved Alan’s facial expressions. I enjoyed her ‘Le Jazz Hot’ from Victor/Victoria but felt she had so much more to give to the song. ‘Corner of the Sky’ from Pippin is another difficult song to sing but Shea delivered it with style and feeling.
I did not know the musical Nine or the song Julian sang, ‘The Bells of Saint Sebastian’, but WOW this was absolutely fantastic! I think we were all enraptured with his singing, it was truly wonderful to listen to and watch.
Well done, Lucy, I loved ‘The History of Wrong Guys’. Such a great song to sing, you can milk the humour even more today; Lauren overacts so much in the actual show. ‘I’m Not That Girl’ was also superbly sung. I enjoyed Chelsea’s numbers, especially ‘This Is Our Story’ from Shrek, another great song to sing; she has a lovely “easy to listen to” voice.
Beverly, I am leaving you until last; what a performance. I think you know we loved your characterisation of ‘He Vas My Boyfriend’. It was fabulous, I could hear every word and your humour and timing was perfect. Well done.
I thought the harmonies and numbers where the chorus joined in were all excellent and always complimented the soloist. I must mention Zarene because, although she did not have a solo as such, she was very noticeable as a good chorus member. The Musical Director, Alastair, worked hard throughout the show keeping the chorus under control!
From beginning to end this was a great production by Jonathan Shiner, Jo Mansfield and her team, who got all the ingredients right which made for a fantastic show. My only comment might be that at some points I felt the music a bit too loud and it drowned out some of the words, but this could well be the acoustics in the room. It did not detract in any way from the enjoyment myself and the audience got from the show.
