Wonderful Town - Opera Holland Park w/ Louise Dearman
Jul 3, 2021 9:14:46 GMT
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xanady likes this
Post by Deleted on Jul 3, 2021 9:14:46 GMT
Agree the speaker location was dreadful. I was in one of the "cheap" (£40) tickets and luckily at the end of a row with no-one beside me so I could move my seat to get a better view. The ushers were very helpful and quite happy to let me do that (and I also appreciated the offer of a blanket in the interval!). However I did find it odd that they repeatedly announced that latecomers wouldn't be admitted but happily let about 10 people in late in two separate batches!
There is barely any rake so anyone with someone tall in front of them will struggle as they haven't staggered the seating properly.
The sound balance is also terrible. I appreciate it's outside, but Regent's Park this ain't (because there they at least have the sound sorted). Probably partly an issue because the speakers were placed where they were, as it meant those of us sitting on the sides got hardly any sound at all. I could barely hear half of what was sung, I lost count of how many times microphone cues were late and the orchestra (fabulous though they were) just drowned everything out.
Enough has been said already about how dated the book is - it just isn't a good show anymore. I didn't believe for a second that Ruth and Eileen were sisters but it didn't really matter as most of the characters weren't believable.
The performances were good and sometimes great, and it was lovely to see a talented bunch of West End performers back on stage and doing some interesting choreography really well (you could tell that about half of them have done stints in Hamilton!). But it was all marred by the extent of the technical issues, which really should have been sorted out.
A pleasant enough evening, but nothing more than that.
Also, I don't want to generalise, but all the Opera Holland Park members I encountered last night came across as entitled so-and-sos, skipping the bar queue, demanding that they get a free programme instead of paying and berating the bar staff when they were told the free programme didn't apply to this show! Really made for a rather unwelcoming atmosphere.
The staff were great though, and apart from the failure to sort any kind of queuing system for the bar the venue is well laid out).
There is barely any rake so anyone with someone tall in front of them will struggle as they haven't staggered the seating properly.
The sound balance is also terrible. I appreciate it's outside, but Regent's Park this ain't (because there they at least have the sound sorted). Probably partly an issue because the speakers were placed where they were, as it meant those of us sitting on the sides got hardly any sound at all. I could barely hear half of what was sung, I lost count of how many times microphone cues were late and the orchestra (fabulous though they were) just drowned everything out.
Enough has been said already about how dated the book is - it just isn't a good show anymore. I didn't believe for a second that Ruth and Eileen were sisters but it didn't really matter as most of the characters weren't believable.
The performances were good and sometimes great, and it was lovely to see a talented bunch of West End performers back on stage and doing some interesting choreography really well (you could tell that about half of them have done stints in Hamilton!). But it was all marred by the extent of the technical issues, which really should have been sorted out.
A pleasant enough evening, but nothing more than that.
Also, I don't want to generalise, but all the Opera Holland Park members I encountered last night came across as entitled so-and-sos, skipping the bar queue, demanding that they get a free programme instead of paying and berating the bar staff when they were told the free programme didn't apply to this show! Really made for a rather unwelcoming atmosphere.
The staff were great though, and apart from the failure to sort any kind of queuing system for the bar the venue is well laid out).
