Musicals - Matilda

There was a bit of funny time leading up to actually seeing this.  And though it is highly embarassing for me, I will write it down in the hopes that it helps me never to do it again!!

We had talked back in October with a friend about going to see this before Christmas, but by the time I looked in to tickets they were all booked up.  In the new year we tried again, but again had to book for further ahead than we really wanted and we ended up choosing between 2 dates in March, but we did get them booked and were looking forward to it.  The week before we were due to go, we realised we didnt have any tickets, so we looked up emails and John found the confirmation... for two weeks previously!!!!  We'd missed it!!!!  I felt so super gutted.  And it was just for us, a friend was coming especially for it!  Having sat in shock for a little while, we found out there were still some tickets available.  Oddly enough, we could buy 1, 2 or 4, so we phoned Lizzie and she was free and wanted to come.  So an additional bundle of money, but we had tickets.

So off we went on Saturday 16th March.  And it was so worth it!  Our upgraded more expensive tickets were in the stalls.  The first most exciting thing was the decor in the theatre entrance.  Lots of school related things like blackboards and letters.  Then in the auditorium it was amazing. It reminded me of Lord of the Rings in the way the set had crept out beyond the stage and into the seating area.  It looked great.

 I definitely loved this set so much!

The child actors were amazing.  They definitely stole the show and were fab.  Matilda definitely had so many lines and performed them so well.  The music didnt grab me totally at the time.  Until the second half had started and a song came on which gave me a pang as I realised I recognised it from somewhere and I was feeling all sentimental towards it, but then I realised I recognised it from listening to the soundtrack in the car in the morning!!  But it was still my favourite bit of the show: 'When I Grow Up', and I have loved watching these youtube videos of it since.  I loved the swings on the stage and John and Lizzie laughed at me for gasping and clapping my hands together at one point in it!

The only criticism we could come up with was that there wasn't quite enough magic tricks and clever moving things in the show for me!  But we would definitely recommend it to others!

Musicals - Priscilla Queen of the Desert

Monday 25th February.  This was another school outing, like Sister Act, organised again by the teacher-into-musicals-in-a-big-way!  He managed to get cheap tickets in pairs all over the theatre so it was funny sitting and looking around to spot others.  I think there was probably close to 20 of us there from school.  Being a Monday night, I was totally surprised how full it was - didn't spot a spare seat.  Most indeed were women in the audience!

I had heard about it in the West End and heard it recommended.  I thought it was something to do with men in drag in Australia, but didn't know heaps.  I was in the middle of reading Craig Revel Horwood's autobiography where he relates some of his life to it, so that was another clue.

The show was great!  An odd storyline indeed, Priscilla being the bus that 3 drag queens use to drive from Sidney to Alice Springs in, for oddly heartfelt reasons.  But the main bit to love was all the big show numbers and the costumes!  What fun they were.  Most of the songs were classic pop or disco songs which most people would know (there were still a few I didn't know in my limited but certainly extended over the last 10 years classic hit knowledge).  It was definitely a show that made you feel good and I was particularly pleased when my year 1 colleague next to me and I stood up simultaneously at the encore to boogie along.  A fun night out indeed.  Oh, and Jason Donovan was in it.  Sadly didn't recognise him, think I was still thinking of him with the Joseph hair, rather than having seen him on Strictly a couple of years ago!  He reminded me loads of Graham Norton!