Robert Gould - Page 7

Robert Gould finds Conor Mitchell and Matthew Hurt's new musical at the Edinburgh Fringe brilliantly therapeutic.

Robert Gould is not convinced that this new musical crosses the threshold into greatness.

Robert Gould 'takes note' of the new Jake Brunger/Pippa Cleary musical that is wowing audiences at this year's Fringe.

Selladoor theatre company welcomes audiences to Falsettoland at the Fringe and Robert Gould exaamines this festival of Finn.

Robert Gould logs in to the musical Chat Room to bring you up to speed with this new Fringe show by Take Note Theatre.

Sixties cool, big band swing and quick-fire tongue-in-cheek humour - those are the ingredients that combine to make the hearty musical fare served up for three performances at the Wales Millennium Centre's intimate Weston Studio on August 6-7 - the world premiere of 'Come Fly With Me', a musical comedy by writers Lee Gilbert and Steve Coleman.

The birth of a new musical involves a mixture of passion, inspiration, frustration, hard work, an element of luck and the coming together of a group of individuals who have the desire and will to make it work. All of those elements have been present in the early stages of the development of a brand new musical I've been fortunate to be involved with - a musical entitled 'After the Turn'.

Spend Spend Spend, a show that first hit the West End back in 1999 - with its tuneful score, hard-nosed but also raunchily humorous book and an emotional core that rings with human truth - is a much underrated gem of a musical. Now, in a newly forged 'actor-musician' production at the Watermill Theatre in Newbury, the gem sparkles and shines even brighter.

The opening number of Sister Act - the musical, which opened on June 2 at the London Palladium, is entitled ?Take Me To Heaven? - and that is precisely what this delightful new show does to its audience. It is divinely fresh, funny and fabulous.

A single figure appears at the back of the stage. A single voice begins to sing a Barry Manilow classic - exquisitely, soon to be joined by the other members of BBC's Last Choir Standing winners 'Only Men Aloud' and suddenly 'One Voice' explodes into an huge wall of sound as stunning vocals advance upon the ears of the audience. This opening number set the tone for the rest of what turned out to be a fantastic evening in the first 'Only Men Aloud' UK national tour, which opened on April 26 at the Swansea Grand Theatre.

The Thorn Birds - which began life as Colleen McCullough's multi-million copy best selling 1977 novel and went on to become one of the most successful TV mini-series of the 1980s - deals with the clash between passionate love and faithful duty to God. Anyone who finds the courage to go to see the new musical version by Ms. McCullough and German classical composer Gloria Bruni, currently in the early stages of its world premiere tour at the Swansea Grand Theatre, may well wonder that if God exists why would he allow such mindless nonsense to be presented to them.

Anyone who has ever experienced the joys - or woes - of transatlantic flying may wish to fasten their seat belts and head off to see a new musical that takes its audience on a flight from London to New York and back again. That is precisely the theatrical experience created by Jet Set Go! (currently playing to capacity audiences at the Jermyn Street Theatre). This 'cabin crew musical' is a sheer delight from take-off to landing.

In a time when the average musical theatre menu served in the West End consists of revived old musicals, bland and rather inconsequential new musicals or purely commercial vehicles with little originality of content and no original score - it is a breath of fresh air to have a musical theatre piece open at a West End house that is new, innovative, has a serious plot with layers of thought-provoking sub-text and also has an original, vibrant score. A breath of Spring air, in fact. The multi-Tony Award winning Spring Awakening, currently playing at the Novello Theatre (fresh from an 'out of town' triumph at the Lyric, Hammersmith) is one of the most exciting shows to hit the West End in years.

On March 22nd, cabaret artiste Leanne Masterton will bring her acclaimed one woman tribute to Jerry Herman, Hello Jerry!, to the intimate Basement in London's Leicester Square Theatre. The revue was last seen in London at the Jermyn Street Theatre in September 2007.

From the misty opening on the Essex marshes to the bittersweet denouement of Dickens' compelling story, Clwyd Theatr Cymru's new musical adaptation of Great Expectations charms, delights and grips its audience throughout. Faithfully yet innovatively adapted and directed by Tim Baker, cleverly enhanced by Mark Bailey's design and seamlessly woven together by a tuneful and atmospheric score of music and songs by Dyfan Jones, the production currently playing at Cardiff's Sherman Theatre during a nationwide tour is a truly thrilling theatrical experience.

On March 22nd, cabaret artiste Leanne Masterton will bring her acclaimed one woman tribute to Jerry Herman, Hello Jerry!, to the intimate Basement in London's Leicester Square Theatre. The revue was last seen in London at the Jermyn Street Theatre in September 2007.

Following their sell-out debut performances last autumn, A Stage Kindly will present a new series of revues of new musical theatre writing at various venues in London and Brighton in March 2009. This new musical theatre initiative provides the opportunity for fresh new writing talent to introduce their work to the stage and gives musical theatre fans a chance to experience possible future hit shows before anyone else.

At the Swansea Grand Theatre on Saturday February 21, the title of 2009 Principality Building Society Welsh Musical Theatre Young Singer Of The Year was awarded to Catherine Mort, a young singer from Swansea who is currently studying at the Guildford School of Acting. The result of the closely fought contest was announced by West End's The Sound Of Music star, Connie Fisher, who was herself the 2006 recipient of the award and who has generously given her time both this year and in 2008 to serve as one of the adjudicators for the contest. Also amongst the list of previous winners of the title are Craig Yates (now a member of BBC's Last Choir Standing winners Only Men Aloud), David Thaxton (the current Enjolras in London's Les Miserables) and Hayley Gallivan (who recently commenced playing the role of Martha in Spring Awakening at the Lyric, Hammersmith).

Hidden away in the tiny basement that is London's Jermyn Street Theatre is a new production of a relatively unknown gem of a show - Saturday Night - with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Casablanca screenwriters, Philip G. and Julius J. Epstein. And in the intimate theatrical world created for the piece by director Tom Littler the gem glistens and gleams with delight.

It is a rare thing in musical theatre that a show comes along that is vibrant, funny, touching, thought provoking, edgy, relevant, timeless and thoroughly entertaining. Spring Awakening is just that kind of rare thing. The Lyric, Hammersmith is the current home of the UK premiere production of Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater's smash hit multi-Tony-Award-winning musical, vividly recreated from his original New York staging by director Michael Mayer.