Thursday, January 09, 2025
New productions to come to London’s West End: Are these unique takes on musical theatre a stretch too far?
The Boar: The end of 2024, and beginning of 2025 ,is already sure to be bringing some exciting new shows to West End theatre. Some already announced, and very highly anticipated, shows include Disney’s Hercules, The Seagull starring Cate Blanchett, Richard II with Jonathan Bailey, and the theatre production of Sam Selvon’s novel The Lonely Londoners.
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3 comments:
I'm glad to hear that Sondheim's last work is going to make it's way to the stage. However, the discussion of it being an unfinished project is certainly important to acknowledge. I hope that people who see this show are familiar enough with Sondheim's works and the context of this show to understand that it may not be finished, but it was still important to share with audiences. Nonetheless, I am sure it is a beautiful musical and I hope it has a successful and well-received run. I am glad that it is going to be shared with the world.
As for Great Comet, that is such a beautiful show and I love to hear that it is on West End now. That musical is so complex and intricate, and the broadway set was ingenious. I really wish I could've seen it live back then. But now that it is up in London, maybe someday that'll come true.
My instant reaction to the title was: of course not! Now that I’ve read the article, my opinion remains the same. Harriet Curry walks the reader through a glimpse of new and existing shows in the West End, as well as the details of the two new shows, Malloy’s Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 and the late Sondheim’s Here We Are. The note on the unusual costume design for Great Comet is intriguing, and I wonder two things: what exactly was the vision of the director (Tim Sheader) for how the costumes demonstrate the world, and how exactly was it executed to fit that vision? I’m not too familiar with Great Comet, but given its exposition, the set and costuming being ‘club wear’ was really off-putting to me. I was able to find photos on the Donmar Warehouse's website - it’s visually interesting, but I’m not sure how it fits into the world of the musical. One thing really stuck out to me that wasn’t mentioned in the article - Russian-style masks used on wealthy-appearing characters in dance.
I do not think that the new productions coming to London's West End are too far too unique or too much of a stretch I personally think that theaters are meant to be experimental so we really shouldn't be setting limits on how far or how crazy or how out of bounds something is I also think it's great to see original and new works on Broadway and the West End because we have so many jukebox musicals and revivals and it's just really great to see a new storyline or new takes on an old storyline so I I'm excited for these shows to come to the west end I've seen a few shows on the west end and I really want to go back and see shows like Great Comet and the sequel and Hercules which I think is super interesting because Hercules was just at the paper mill Playhouse so I'm I would be really excited to see Hercules on the west and so no I do not think these takes are too far because I think theaters meant to be experimental.
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