Everybody’s Talking About Jamie - UK Tour & Peacock Theatre

[keekio2]

He posted on his story about it so I think he was first cover but now alternate

[Dr Tom]

Despite the advertised billing, Jamie looks suspiciously like Layton tonight. Although he has added lots of new grunts and screeches to his performance since I last saw him in London.

On the plus side, I knew there must have been a good reason for my choosing a £12 seat.

In the show's defence, they are obviously very short of cast members and I presume Layton must have agreed to the extra show. Adam is in his normal role. There are only two drag queens!

Proper thoughts later. This is my first time seeing the tour, despite having seen the London production many times. It looks really odd on such a huge stage. Doing my best to work out who is on, but I’m near the back of the Stalls and my eyesight must be going a bit. It is a big theatre. Great seat legroom and excellent rake though. It’s very full and the Shane Richie fans are certainly in.

[Dr Tom]

A few day after thoughts.

The show ran long, not finishing until after 22:20 (so I had to get a later train home from Woking than usual), which surprised me as Layton seemed to be racing through his lines.

Quite a lot of small changes to the London production, but it's impossible to know if they're official or not. Things like Layton saying "My agent" when the phone rings, instead of "rude". Lots of what looked like attempted ad-libbing with a little corpsing between Layton and Shane, but it's hard to tell if they do that every night or not. They've changed the script for the scenes with Jamie's Dad a lot.

Very odd to see this without all the automated technology in place to move the set, with people having to push the house out, for example.

Layton was much softer in his approach than I remembered and his vocals were better. The bus station scene audio was very odd, with a doubling of the Jamie vocals running about a second behind the main vocals (which I can't believe was intentional).

I don't want to judge the vocals too harshly as I suspect there is some illness going around the cast and there were some tricks used to hide this. As I haven't seen this cast before, I also can't compare them. I must say that Sharan Phull is excellent as Pritti. I remember seeing her as the lead in Bend It and she was excellent there too. Amy Ellen Richardson's voice was straining a bit during He's My Boy.

There's no obvious cast board on the tour, but there were signs up detailing two covers. Lisa-Marie Holmes was on as Ray. She was very good and it's always a gift of a part. Cameron Johnson was on as Sandra Bollock as well as his normal role of Jamie's Dad. There was no Tray Sophisticay, so some odd line cuts and reallocations during the drag queen sections, but it worked. I'm fairly sure it was Alex Hetherington on as Mickie, not Ryan Hughes, but that wasn't acknowledged anywhere. Odd to see Zahra Jones on as Bex, when she was Becca for so long in London.

Anyway, in some ways it was nice to have seen Layton again, but I do have tickets booked for Wimbledon and I hope that Adam Taylor is on there as scheduled.

[Dr Tom]

A report from Wimbledon last night. Much better than Woking with everyone on form, including Adam on as advertised in the lead role.

An aside, Adam was originally advertised to do the whole week but is now only on until Friday, so do bear this in mind if you've booked to see him. I presume Layton is back early, rather than the 2nd cover being on.

They don't list the cast anywhere obvious, but Alex Hetherington was on as "Daniel" (usually the role is "Sayid" but I guess that name would sound odd).

First time seeing Sasha Latoya as Ray, who was very good. It is odd seeing the tour staging of Ray making a crisp sandwich rather than a jam sandwich. Nice to see Ryan Hughes as Mickey (the first time for me in a few years). And I continue to think that Sharan Phull is excellent.

I had two women near me on the front row who were happily getting through their drinks, chatting to one another and then managed the unusual combination of both laughing and cheering loudly during "He's My Boy".

Would love to get back to see this cast again but I'm away the rest of the week. Definitely worth seeing, especially as the tour has only got a few stops left. No news yet on a London return, but Wimbledon was pretty full last night so this could easily tour again.

[TallPaul]

It's the tour's triumphant homecoming next week. There are currently a grand total of three tickets available across the nine performances.

[keekio2]

Do we know of the show is gonna return to the west end this year ?

[drowseychap]

I’m a huge Jamie fan seeing it initially in Sheffield then with the changes in London and the London run seeing it 7 times couldn’t get enough of it
So was mortified that seeing it in Wolverhampton on tour stopped
It dead in its tracks for me after seeing Layton as Jamie …. I just really don’t see what all the fuss about him is ? I saw lots of different Jamie’s in the west end and all including understudies were so much better imo
It ruined Jamie for me and don’t think I will ever see it again with Layton in the role

[TallPaul]

I think Mater enjoyed Wednesday's matinee. Apart from telling me that Shane Richie is in it, she's mostly talked about the two women sitting next to her. They'd travelled all the way from deepest Wolverhampton just to see the show. Even offered to buy her a drink at the interval!

Must be nice to visit a regional theatre where the seats actually face the stage. 😉 No £4 booking fee either.

[enh2]

Everybody's Talking About Jamie will embark on a second UK and Ireland tour late next year and into 2024.

Opening at The Lowry on 7th September 2023 and playing until the 17th Sep.

[drowseychap]

Good news but please please please no more Layton …

[Rory]

Is this coming back to London?

[LaLuPone]

Or Kinky Boots

[Mark]

Heck, give me Devil Wears Prada

[c4ndyc4ne]

Is that a head and heels?

[bobbievanhusen]

Jan 4, 2023 23:03:08 GMT c4ndyc4ne said:

Is that a head and heels?

I suspect its the UK premier of Head over Heels.

I know its already been announced for Manchester, so maybe the casting for it?

[drowseychap]

As long as Layton is not there I will be ….. a huge fan of the show since first show In Sheffield…. Seen 4 Jamie’s and seeing Layton on uk tour ruined it for me swore I would never go again if he was in it so fingers crossed 🤞

[Dr Tom]

I'm thinking it should be Ivano, especially since he did the Jamie number on Strictly!

[cezbear]

I usually like Ivano but he did not sing it well on Strictly. Then again nothing from Jamie ever sounds good to me.
(Sorry Dr Tom, I promise I'm not deliberately following you around threads disagreeing with you!)

[intoanewlife]

Why does everyone hate Layton so much?

Is it a social media thing?

I saw him in London and thought he was fantastic and his replacement was nowhere near as good.

I did find his Jamie extremely unlikeable until he gets his comeuppance and grows up a bit in Act 2, but I actually thought that added a lot to the show as opposed to liking his character from the start.

In fact without that redemption arc the show is actually a lot less interesting and I think the film suffers because of that aspect being missing as well.

[westendfan1]

Jan 5, 2023 18:07:55 GMT intoanewlife said:

Why does everyone hate Layton so much?

I'm not sure it's a case of hating him. For me, it's just that he's not half as talented as he thinks he is. In fact, as an actor/singer I'd say he's pretty poor.

[BurlyBeaR]

The impression I got when I saw him on the tour was that he thought the name of the show had changed to “Everybody’s Talking About Layton”. It was a lot of self indulgent playing up to the yaaass queeen teenager contingent in the audience. 

If his performance had lived up to this I might have been a bit more ok with it but it was sub-par in every respect.

[intoanewlife]

Jan 5, 2023 18:58:02 GMT BurlyBeaR said:

The impression I got when I saw him on the tour was that he thought the name of the show had changed to “Everybody’s Talking About Layton”. It was a lot of self indulgent playing up to the yaaass queeen teenager contingent in the audience. 

If his performance had lived up to this I might have been a bit more ok with it but it was sub-par in every respect.

Ah ok. I saw him very early on in his London run, I think it was only his second week.

Clearly it all went to his head a little and got amped more the longer he was in it.

As I said I thought the arrogance was a part of the character and actually worked quite well, but if it got worse I can imagine it was even more grating.

[BurlyBeaR]

John McCrea didn’t play it as arrogant. Not inthe original Crucible run anyway. Far from it.

[robertb213]

Layton had sass for days but no vulnerability, Jamie doesn't work without that.

[drowseychap]

For me he was more hype over talent like others said thinks he’s more talented than he is … his voice wasn’t strong enough for me and found the performance very flat and one dimensional compared to the other Jamie’s I’ve seen .
Didn’t like the changes on the tour either even the small changes like when the phone rings …. Line used to be Rude ! Then on tour was something like it’s my agent … for me just didn’t work .

I stayed for post show talk Shobna was first on couple of others then Shane …. 10 mins into talk Layton comes on with cases and scarf shades. Blows kisses waves takes 2 questions apologises bless him he was sick and had to get train …( a few rolled eyes ) but had great 25 mins with rest of the cast .

Would be nice to have a Jamie Campbell type Jamie back for a change after all he is a real person