Robert Gould - Page 8

In a year when new musical theatre productions in London consisted of juke box transfers, classic revivals, whimsical adventure stories and majestic failures, one might be forgiven for thinking that the age of great new musicals exists merely in days of Auld Lang Syne. So let's pause and think back over the year's musical fayre.

First there was the classic, stylish Billy Wilder Hollywood 'film noire'; then there was the highly melodic but perhaps slightly overblown Trevor Nunn staging of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical; now there is the darkly stylish Craig Revel Horwood staging of the Lloyd Webber musical, transferring from a sell-out run at the Watermill Theatre, bringing Sunset Boulevard back to the West End.

Yet another 'juke-box musical' with a whimsical plot written around a collection of well known hit songs would appear on the surface to be a nightmare theatrical scenario. But Bill Kenwright's production of Can't Smile Without You currently playing at the Bristol Hippodrome during the early stages of its UK tour turns out to be a very pleasant and hugely enjoyable surprise. The enjoyment is due partly to the fact that the hit songs are by Barry Manilow - a vintage songwriter whose melodies always soar and touch the right emotional buttons - and partly due to some knock-out performances by an immensely talented cast.

David Harrower's play, 365, currently being staged by the National Theatre of Scotland at the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith following a successful run at this year's Edinburgh International Festival, is a quite stunning piece of theatre that examines the experiences of a disparate group of 'care-leavers' as they embark upon the frightening first steps to independence and adulthood.

'Jet Set Go!', the cabin crew musical that delighted audiences at the Edinburgh Fringe between August 2 and 24, is ready to take off for London. This highly entertaining new musical, with book and lyrics by Jake Brunger and music by Pippa Cleary will enjoy a short run at Theatre 503 from Tuesday September 2 until Saturday September 6.

The Joe Dipietro and Jimmy Roberts musical revue, 'I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change', is a smash hit Off Broadway show which in July 2008 ended a 12 year run of over 5,000 performances at New York's Westside Theatre. In August 2008 Edinburgh's Fringe fans have been flocking to Take Note Theatre's production at George Square. And it's not hard to see why. It's a great production of a great show.

'Only the brave die young' claims a lyric line in the title song of the over-hyped and under achieving musical 'Only The Brave' playing at this year's Edinburgh Fringe Festival. If you are a discerning fan of serious musical theatre then perhaps a more apt phrase would be 'only the brave should come'.

An elite group of graduate students from The Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama have been serving up a delicious musical theatre menu at the Edinburgh Fringe for the past three weeks with Sally Rapier's atmospheric and tightly knit UK premiere production of The Off-Broadway musical 'The Spitfire Grill'.

Currently taking off at the Edinburgh Fringe's intimate George Square 2 venue is a new British musical, Jet, Set Go! by Pippa Cleary and Jake Brunger, directed by Luke Sheppard. For 75 minutes audiences are treated to a hugely enjoyable feast of humour and catchy tunes as this 'cabin crew musical' takes them on a return flight between London Heathrow and JFK New York, spying on the lives of the aircraft's crew both during the flights and on their brief stay in the Big Apple.

The magic of Manilow is about to hit the stage across the UK with Bill Kenwright's production of the new musical Can't Smile Without You. Joining pop/rock singer-songwriter Chesney Hawkes in the show's leading roles will be BBC's How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria finalist Siobhan Dillon and I'd Do Anything contestant Francesca Jackson.

Connie Fisher makes a welcome return to the stage this week as she begins previews in the Marvin Hamlish/Carole Bayer Sager/Neil Simon musical They're Playing Our Song at the Menier Chocolate Factory. Previews of the show, which will be directed by Fiona Laird, begin on July 25 prior to an August 4 opening. The production will run till September 28.

From the moment the cast of twelve actor/musicians step out onto Diego Pitarch's atmospheric set, which draws its focus from a central black spiral staircase, and begin to play the strains of Andrew Lloyd Webber's haunting musical prologue for Sunset Boulevard, the audience at the Watermill Theatre, Newbury are drawn into a dark, yet richly evocative world that captivates the mind and thrills the senses throughout.

Marguerite, the new musical currently playing at London's Theatre Royal, Haymarket, has most of the ingredients required to make a great show - stunning music, a wonderfully inventive set, a very strong story that should stir the emotions of an audience, a stellar cast led by performers of genuine star quality and a creative team whose previous track record proves they know how to create a hit. But somehow the result is slightly unsatisfying.

Reality TV merged with Musical Theatre again this weekend as presenter Graham Norton reunited with the 'Phantom Lord' Webber in BBC's I'd Do Anything, which aims to cast the roles of Oliver and Nancy for the upcoming Cameron Mackintosh production of Oliver! at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. Following in the footsteps of previous searches, which earned Connie Fisher and Lee Meade leading roles in The Sound Of Music and Joseph And The Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, twelve potential Nancys sang their hearts out in a bid to gain the votes of the viewing public.

West End Sound of Music star Connie Fisher swapped her nun's wimple for an adjudicator's hat at the Grand Theatre, Swansea on Saturday March 1st as a member of the adjudicating panel for the 2008 Welsh Young Musical Theatre Singer of the Year contest. During the evening Connie also made a welcome return to the stage where she was herself the 2006 winner of the contest before going on to earn stardom as the winner of the BBC's How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria talent show. After being greeted by rapturous applause from the audience in her native Wales, she treated the crowd to a rendition of Cole Porter's classic tongue twister, 'The Physician' (first sung by Gertrude Lawrence in Nymph Errant in 1933). Then she returned to the score of The Sound of Music to sing 'Edelweiss', accompanied by the Dunvant Male Choir, before completing her short programme with a virtuoso rendition of Charles Strouse and Richard Maltby's 'Everybody Wants To Do A Musical' - a song from the musical Nick and Nora she had performed on the same stage the night she became the Welsh Young Musical Theatre Singer of the year two years ago.

London's Player's Theatre will play host in March to the UK premiere of the recent Off-Broadway show, Make Me a Song - a 'songfest' of numbers from the inspirational pen of Tony Award winning composer/lyricist, William Finn.

When Jonathon Larson conceived his ground-breaking musical Rent, he set out to create a serious piece of musical theatre with a rock score. Director William Baker and musical supervisor Steve Anderson have decided to 'remix' what has become a revered rock cult classic musical rather than re-hash the Broadway and previous West End productions. Unfortunately, despite some quite lavish new orchestrations and some great vocal performances, it does not totally work.

In a Broadwayworld.com exclusive, hot budding star Francesca Jackson, set to play lesbian lawyer Joanne opposite Denise van Outen's Maureen in the upcoming West End 'Remix' of Rent, talks to Robert Gould about her career and her role in the Jonathon Larsen musical.

The current UK tour production of the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Charles Hart/Don Black musical, Aspects Of Love, graces the stage of Cardiff's New Theatre this week on its way to 15 other venues, ending at Nottingham on March 22, 2008. On the evidence of the Cardiff staging, director Nikolai Foster, aided by a stark and stunningly atmospheric set designed by Rob Jones, has succeeded in breathing new life into this 1980 show, which boasts what is perhaps Lord Lloyd Webber's most romantic score.

The old millennium is in its dying moments and the new millennium is about to begin as a group of friends, lovers and ex-lovers gather in a Manhattan loft apartment on New Year's Eve. As the plot develops, relationships and friendships also witness their dying moments while others develop new beginnings as past mistakes collide with new resolutions. Add to this a bright, tuneful and witty score by composer Charles Miller and librettist/lyricist, Kevin Hammonds and you have the ingredients for a highly enjoyable musical - which is precisely what is currently on the menu at the London fringe venue, the Finborough Theatre (until September 29).When Midnight Strikes, cleverly directed in the theatre?s tiny but highly atmospheric space by Fenton Gray, is a sheer delight.