JANE MCDONALD - THEATRE INTERVIEW

PANTOMIME INTERVIEWS 2014:
Jane McDonald - Jack and the Beanstalk (Birmingham Hippodrome)

Last week, we brought you a review of Loose Woman, Singer-Songwriter and all-round National Treasure Jane McDonald's latest UK Tour, Singer of Your Song, citing it as 'classy', 'tour-de-force' and 'supremely impressive'. This week, in the second part of our Jane triple-dip, Kyle caught up with her at the Birmingham Hippodrome to discuss her upcoming panto debut in Jack and the Beanstalk, the inspiration behind her first album in six years, and how it feels to be in greater demand than ever 16 years after first rising to success.

By Kyle Pedley.

Interview conducted Friday 12 September 2014.

Jane as she will appear as 'The Enchantress'
in Jack and the Beanstalk

Jane, thank you so much for your time...

My Pleasure!

Now, you seem to be busier than ever at the moment, between your new album, touring with sold out live shows, and now the Panto. How are you finding it all?

Well to be quite honest I’m a bit shocked I’m that busy, because I’ve been doing this for quite some time now and I keep thinking it’s going to slow down, and every time I come out of something, I think ‘Right, I can put my feet up a little bit more now’, but actually the time just gets filled with something else. 

CATS - THEATRE REVIEW

CATS AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Tuesday 09 - Saturday 27 September 2014

Performance Reviewed: Wednesday 10 September (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

'Memory' seems to be a very potent ingredient in the tastes and penchants of current theatre-going audiences. As noted in my review of London's highly successful and celebrated Miss Saigon revival last month, there is clearly a demand and yearning for the familiar both in the West End and beyond, as nostalgia and the proven seem to be edging out the original and unknown. By no means is this particularly unusual or new, we live in a creative climate where the industries' Olivier awards have an entire category dedicated to revivals in recognition of their number and popularity, but it does seem to have hit something of a boiling point in recent years. Fortunately, for all of the pedestrian, perfunctory cash-cow productions being rolled out to ride this particular wave of demand, it also is the perfect environment to witness the return of some true musical greats, amongst which Andrew Lloyd-Webber's cherished and prolific Cats undoubtedly deserves to be classed.

WICKED - THEATRE REVIEW

WICKED AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Wednesday 09 July - Saturday 06 September 2014

Performance Reviewed: Thursday 10 July (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Wicked will cast it's spell upon you... Wicked is wicked-ly good... Spellbinding!

With that obligatory bit of housekeeping out of the way, it's almost difficult to comprehend what to say about musical colossus Wicked that hasn't already been said countless times over. One of the most celebrated and successful musicals of the 21st Century, it is an internationally renowned mega-hit whose adoration (and ticket sales) show no sign of dwindling any time soon. Winnie Holzman's adapted tale that takes a canted look at the witches of Oz (taken from Gregory Maguire's more morbid book of the same name) combined with Stephen Schwartz's already-iconic music has leapt into our collective cultural consciousness and tapped into a generational zeitgeist in a way that most other musicals could only dream of.  And now, as the show takes off on its first ever UK and Ireland tour, the fervour and excitement in Birmingham and the surrounding area for the show's arrival at the city's Hippodrome theatre has been at fever pitch, showing that these witches are as 'popular' as ever and just as adept at defying expectations as they are gravity.

THEATRE INTERVIEW - Nikki Davis-Jones (Wicked)

WICKED INTERVIEWS:

Part One - Nikki Davis-Jones (Elphaba)

Wicked flies on in to the Birmingham Hippodrome next week as part of it's first ever UK and Ireland tour, and we are celebrating the occasion with a pair of interviews with the two of the show's leads.

In this first part, Kyle sits down with actress Nikki-Davis Jones, who plays Elphaba in the show, and discusses how Wicked is proving to be the gift that keeps on giving...

By Kyle Pedley.

Interview Conducted Thursday 24th April 2014.

Nikki Davis-Jones as Elphaba
in Wicked

“I’m clearly not very good in auditions!”

It’s a modest dash of self-deprecation from the lady who has bagged one of musical theatre’s most coveted leading roles, and further indicative of a warm, humble personality that likewise may initially seem at odds with the role she has been drafted in to play. But such humility is not without context and reasoning, with a string of standby and cover roles in shows such as Blood Brothers and Mamma Mia that led to eventual promotions being the career pattern for actress Nikki Davis-Jones thus far.

That was before a certain green-skinned opportunity came flying in on a golden broomstick and looks set to change her career ‘For Good’.

SHOW BOAT - THEATRE REVIEW

SHOW BOAT AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Wednesday 02 - Saturday 05 July 2014

Performance Reviewed: Wednesday 02 July (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Birmingham certainly seems to be getting into the 4th July spirit this year, serving up a double dose of all-American Classic Musical goodness as Cape Town Opera’s Show Boat rolls into town for the week at the Hippodrome, following Annie Get Your Gun which kicked off it’s run at the New Alex yesterday evening (and garnered a 3 star review from us). But whereas Annie Get Your Gun seemed to be a strangely muted and subdued affair that didn’t live up to it’s glimmers of potential and pedigree, Show Boat is undoubtedly the real deal; a big, grand, hugely impressive slice of classic musical theatre writ large and executed with scope and grandeur that nevertheless displays extraordinary attention to detail.

ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS - THEATRE REVIEW

ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Monday 26 - Saturday 31 May 2014
Performance Reviewed: Monday 26 May 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Prefacing a review with a retrospective hardly seems the most succinct of approaches, but in addressing One Man, Two Guvnors, it seems prudent to draw attention to a perspective I offered whilst discussing Michael Frayn’s seminal farce Noises Off last year: 

LORD OF THE FLIES - THEATRE REVIEW

LORD OF THE FLIES AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME (International Dance Festival Birmingham)

Theatre Run: Wednesday 14 - Saturday 17 May 2014
Performance Reviewed: Thursday 15 May 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

William Golding’s magnum opus, Lord of the Flies, remains one of the continuing tentpoles of English Literature, and naturally has thus been adapted to stage and screen in almost every possible iteration imaginable. The simplicity of it’s tale - a group of schoolboys find themselves deserted on a remote island and gradually resort to feral, primitive behaviour as they fight to survive - remains as potent as ever, and it’s exploration of the human condition, societal structure and innate feral regression makes it rich for dramatisation and adaptation across a wealth of different mediums and forms. It is exciting, then, to see it given such a biting, inventive and quite boldly visceral re-imagining, courtesy of acclaimed choreographer and dance director Matthew Bourne, as part of this years International Dance Festival Birmingham.

HAPPY DAYS: A NEW MUSICAL - THEATRE REVIEW

HAPPY DAYS: A NEW MUSICAL AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Tuesday 22 - Saturday 26 April 2014

Performance Reviewed: Tuesday 22 April 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Happy Days is something of an oddity to review and fully digest as a brand new musical production (something which, as its marketing repeatedly assures us, it is) given that it leans so heavily on nostalgia and formula to the point that it not only feels dated but also heavily derivative. It seems an unfair critique to labour over the antiquity of a show based on a 1970’s sitcom which itself was set 20 years prior, but there is very little trace of modernity, irony or invention to practically everything Happy Days offers. This may, of course, be precisely the point, owing to the TV series' original creator Garry Marshall having penned the shows book, and there is likely a fairly broad demographic who will get a kick from such a faithfully styled recreation of the hugely popular show being brought to the stage, but for the rest of us it’s difficult to shake the feeling that his has all been done and seen before with greater fire in its belly and punch in its execution. Take Grease, Footloose and a soupcon of Hairspray, blend them together whilst simultaneously diluting their respective character and vim, and you pretty much have Happy Days - a perfectly inoffensive yet not particularly effective simulacra of the feel-good, period musicals of yesteryear.

EVITA - THEATRE REVIEW

EVITA AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Tuesday 08 - Saturday 19 April 2014
Performance Reviewed: Wednesday 09 April 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s musical colossus Evita returns to the Midlands this week as this sumptuous, technically audacious production of the show continues its acclaimed UK national tour. Everything that made the show such a towering and impressive achievement well worthy of its five star review we bestowed upon it last year remains thankfully intact, with an indelible aura of quality and, at times, majesty permeating around what is surprisingly one of Lloyd Webber and Rice’s earliest collaborations. The sophistication and maturity with which they weave the tale of Eva Peron’s rise from obscurity to political and cultural juggernaut through a masterful, instantly recognisable soundtrack remains as bold, beautiful and intricate as ever. And with the sublime Madalena Alberto thankfully remaining front and centre as the titular character, Birmingham audiences have the opportunity to witness what surely must be the definitive interpretation and performance of one of musical theatre’s most iconic and demanding roles.

SINGIN' IN THE RAIN - THEATRE REVIEW

SINGIN' IN THE RAIN AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Tuesday 18 March - Saturday 05 April 2014

Performance Reviewed: Wednesday 19 March (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Singin’ in the Rain as a stage musical is something of an oddity on paper – a stage production of a movie musical chronicling the fictitious production of, somewhat postmodernly, the first movie musical. The original, now-iconic 1952 film, complete with beloved performances from the likes of screen legends Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds, as well as a myriad of instantly recognisable sequences and set pieces that have become etched in film iconography, had tremendous fun with it’s own movie-within-a-movie approach, as well as having some knowing winks and nudges to the Hollywood studio system and politics of the time (not to mention the decades preceding it). It was also a big, vibrant and showy release, nestled comfortably within the golden Hollywood era of musicals, and it’s big-budget stylings, high-profile cameos (from the like of Cyd Charisse as the sultry Broadway dancer) and much-publicised ‘dazzling technicolor’ all part of the razzmatazz and splendour.

FIDDLER ON THE ROOF - THEATRE REVIEW

FIDDLER ON THE ROOF AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Tuesday 11 - Saturday 15 March 2014

Performance Reviewed: Tuesday 11 March 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Tradition!

Paul Michael Glaser and his delightful troupe of fellow players segue us into Fiddler on the Roof with this instantly recognisable ode to, unsurprisingly, traditional values, roles and aspirations within the quaint Jewish community who inhabit the show, and yet it also serves as a perfect tonal leaping point for what is fundamentally in and of itself a thoroughly traditional yet delightfully characterful, somewhat old-fashioned observational slice of charming musical theatre. There is no grand overriding narrative, save for the occasional allusions to the wider civil unrest and approaching revolution of early 20th Century Tsarist Russia, which now and again comes knocking in the form of an over-zealous, potentially anti-semitic constable and his enforcers, but for the most part this is a measured, slower-burning study of character, society and even faith within a simple rural community. Many of the musical interludes from Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock’s now iconic score, from ‘If I Were a Rich Man’ to ‘Matchmaker’, clever and individual as they may be, are mostly stop-start affairs to give us a more palatable understanding of the characters themselves as opposed to driving forward the light semblance of plot.

LA TRAVIATA (WELSH NATIONAL OPERA) - THEATRE REVIEW

WELSH NATIONAL OPERA PRESENTS 'LA TRAVIATA' AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: 04, 08 March 2014 (Manon Lescaut and Boulevard Solitude run in between)

Performance Reviewed: Tuesday 04 March 2014 (Press Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

I rarely offer any personal or contextual preface to my critiques, but it seems particularly prudent going into this review to clarify it as having been not only my inaugural opera review, but also indeed my first opera viewing experience. I have always afforded the form the utmost of respect from an outsiders perspective, not to mention a growing intrigue and curiosity that shall hopefully lend this review an added relevance and purpose to those readers out there who may similarly have never been.

THE LION KING - THEATRE REVIEW

THE LION KING AT THE BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME

Theatre Run: Friday 28 June - Saturday 28 September 2013

Performance Reviewed: Friday 28 June (Opening Night)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Film to stage adaptations can be quite the challenge to get right. It may seem an obvious point that theatre and cinema are two wildly different mediums and creative forms, but it’s often overlooked in the hopes that merely replicating the images that we watched on-screen onto the stage will rekindle the same emotions, impact and fire in an audience. The opposite is a far easier and more liberating experience - the scope and breadth of film, the luxury of the edit and the canvas of cinematography can often open up a previously stage-bound tale to new sights and heights, yet so often film-to-theatre is a much bumpier process. Slavishly loyal adaptations fail to explore and utilise the unique strengths and opportunities of the medium or, sometimes worse, do so in horribly egregious and detrimental ways (see the recent Broadway failure of The Little Mermaid, another Disney offering).