June - Theatre Month

The West End theatre district of London is arguably as famous as Broadway. We've seen a few shows off and on since we've been here, but we'd been saving a few of the main ones, and decided that the summer was the perfect time. We ended up going to 3 during the month of June, all of which were excellent.

June 3rd - Oliver!

I read Oliver Twist by the great Mr. Dickens (who is an English national hero, by the way), a little more than a year ago. They've been playing the musical version here for a while, but around Christmas the lead role (which in the play version is not Oliver) was taken over by Rowan Atkinson. Yes, that's Mr. Bean. Since I enjoyed the book and we thought it would be funny to see him. We had to go.

Jenna started reading the book about 3 days before the show. She was able to finish it during the intermission, and she really loved it.

Unfortunately, the show diverges significantly from the book. For one, they have to focus on the adult roles a little more because otherwise they'd have to put more pressure on the child actors, who by law have to rotate nightly, and talent is probably not as good. Worse, though, is that they changed the story line to be more about the redemption of the bad guys than about the triumph of young Oliver. That was kind of disappointing, but in all it was still a pretty enjoyable show, and we got a good laugh out of a few of the Bean-isms.

June 9th - Mama Mia!

You can guess who wanted to go see this one.

We went just a few days after seeing Oliver. The theatre was newer (or at least more recently renovated) so the seats had better leg room and were more comfortable. Also, our seats were a little better, so the experience in general was a little better from the beginning.

One good thing about seeing this musical is that the Brits love it. It was fun to see everyone, men, women and children singing along.

The music was very good. I knew a few songs, and since Jenna had seen the recent movie she pretty much knew them all, so that was nice. From what she tells me, the main guy was significantly better than Pierce Brosnan. Probably not something I'd go back to, although I think Jenna is hoping to go again either with friends here in town or with my Mom when she comes over.

June 28th - Romeo and Juliet

In case you didn't know, here is a history lesson: Shakespeare was a genius. He was smart enough to write plays that appealed to both the upper and lower classes, but then he also built a theatre that was the perfect to display them. The Globe Theatre was unique in its time, having a large standing room only section that ran straight up to the stage, and then theatre style seats along the outside.

(note: this photo was stolen from Eric and Anne. Our seats were down in the corner, and their pictures came out a lot better - although since I stole it offline, it is a little pixel-y)

The original Globe burned down in one of the many great fires that London has seen, but was rebuilt in the recent past. You can visit year round, but in the summer plays are put on by the Royal Shakespeare Academy (which is where a many famous Brit actors got their start, including Colin Firth, Daniel Day Lewis, Judi Dench, Jude Law, Ian McKellen, Ben Kingsley, Jeremy Irons, and Patrick Stewart).

We booked tickets to Romeo and Juliet because we figured we knew that story well, while with other plays we'd probably lose a lot in the translation. We got actual seats rather than the standing room section, which we were really glad about when it started pouring rain (like in Will's day, it is open air).

The play was very good. We were able to follow along perfectly, although since there were no microphones we did miss a few things, which made us glad we didn't pick a different show. A few interesting points - The female roles were played by women, not men like they would have originally been. Juliet, who in the play was 13, was perfectly cast, because all though she was an adult, she looked like she was about, well, 13. Lastly, the Montague parents were both white, but Romeo was black, so I thought daddy should have been asking a few questions.

We had a great time seeing all of these shows. Just one more reason to love this city! We plan to see a few more shows before we go (Wicked and Billy Elliot are definites on the list), but we were happy to take a month to see these few!!!