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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 6, 2024 9:08:09 GMT
Very excited about tonight. (Thanks dr Tom) Also relieved to hear the invited dress went ahead last night. I have had a shocking run of luck with first previews being cancelled/heavily delayed so I’ve had to leave for trains etc. Or arriving in London only to find out it had been cancelled. Given I now travel for London theatre, touch wood this goes ahead as planned! Were there any delays, stoppages of malfunctions - and was it running to the listed running time please? It’s down for 2hr 30 incl 15 minute interval and a 7:30pm start, so out by 10pm? There were no stops or delays, I think it ran 2hr 30 but can’t be 100% sure, I didn’t check the time |
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Post by lotster on Mar 6, 2024 9:28:56 GMT
I was looking at tickets on the Delfont site and whilst previews don't have many tix showing, there is very good availability for April. Plenty of tickets. Do we think they might do rush/discounts, or perhaps after good reviews on Press Night tickets will sell?!
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Post by ceebee on Mar 6, 2024 10:20:14 GMT
Oh the joy of having lovely friends in the business. I managed to get a ticket to tonight’s dress rehearsal and all I can say is WOW. The show was absolutely tremendous. Myles Frost is even better than in New York , An Olivier is surely coming his way (in 2025 I assume?) and the whole company is quite brilliant. Fabulously staged, slick and with that catalogue of incredible songs. Stunning set, costume and lighting design. Standing ovation after Thriller I suspect London will really embrace this show, it’s on another level to almost any jukebox show that’s been here (though to call it that is way too reductive) Can’t wait to see it Saturday (when I had tickets booked for anyway) 5 stars I have a ticket for Saturday night and am now super excited for this. Pop your five stars on the poll to kick-start the scoring! |
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Post by david on Mar 6, 2024 10:30:59 GMT
After seeing stuff posted on YT and to read such a positive review for this one, I’m booked in for the 21/3 matinee. It can’t come soon enough.
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Post by kathryn on Mar 6, 2024 10:36:19 GMT
know an invited Dress isn’t the best gauge of a proper audience- but I haven’t seen an audience react to the songs like that … since seeing this very show in NYC. Is there any way for mere mortals like many of us to ever get invited to an 'invited dress'? Seeing this week after next and VERY excited. Invest in the show. 😉 |
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Post by fiyero on Mar 6, 2024 21:00:57 GMT
Omg the audience are awful tonight. These people are not theatre people. Apart from more photos being taken than normal the ones around me (rear stalls) are better than I expected! First public performance of a jukebox musical is always going to bring an interesting audience! |
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Post by apubleed on Mar 6, 2024 21:06:25 GMT
Photos, texting, children probably too young to be in theatre, people walking in and out, singing. It’s too much!!!
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Post by Being Alive on Mar 6, 2024 21:59:59 GMT
Photos, texting, children probably too young to be in theatre, people walking in and out, singing. It’s too much!!! Who could have predicted this 🙄 |
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Post by fiyero on Mar 6, 2024 22:46:46 GMT
Photos, texting, children probably too young to be in theatre, people walking in and out, singing. It’s too much!!! All true, but apart from the 3 year old all less than I expected still! (I suppose technically a 3 year old is less than I expected as I didn’t expect any kids on a Wednesday school night). I expect longer reviews to follow but this was one of the most incredible things I have seen in a theatre on a spectacular scale. Other shows have touched me more, much more, but enabling us to imagine the process and what was seen in performances I am (just about) too young to remember was something to behold. I dread to think what Saturday audiences might be like but I think this show will run! |
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Post by FJ on Mar 6, 2024 23:33:21 GMT
Couldn’t agree more about the audience, the worst west end audience I’ve experienced in a while. So much singing, talking, shouting out, phones going off.
I enjoyed the music, and the choreography, and the whole Thriller sequence was amazing, but for me the show fell a bit flat.
The songs were great, but the scenes really dragged. Enjoyed the first act more than the second. Glad I’ve seen it but probably won’t rush back, but I think it’ll find a decent audience.
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Post by Steve on Mar 7, 2024 0:46:20 GMT
Saw this tonight, and Myles Frost is magician, bringing Jackson to vivid exciting life. There are some magnificent set pieces, in particular in the second half. Some spoilers follow. . . Unfortunately, there is little drama in the first half, with an ingratiating Jackson clogging up the running time by endless conversations about how much more money he would like to spend on every bit of the Dangerous tour. Since he has absolute power over the tour, there is no drama in that, as noone can convincingly oppose him. As someone who loved "Thriller Live" (maybe the only one on this board lol), I was frustrated at the fact that this amazing asset (Frost) wasn't given more singing and dancing to do, in lieu of talking about budgets, which meant that I found the first half less entertaining than "Thriller Live." The threat of Ashley Zhanghasa's controlling Joseph over the younger Jackson is the only dramatic tonic to the dull overplayed perfectionism storyline. In fact, I found the storyline of "Ain't Too Proud" considerably more compelling (main link between these musical biographies is that Mitchell Zhanghasa was great in both). There are some good numbers in the first half of MJ (including a haunting "Strangers in Moscow" and a thrilling "They Don't Care About Us") of which I found "Wanna be Starting Something" the most exciting and entertaining, as it allowed Mitchell Zhanghasa's Young Adult Michael and Myles Frost's MJ both to strut and sing exceptionally, and it integrated the introduction of "Thriller" to boot. It was in the second half, though ,that I got more excited about the show, as I absolutely loved the contextualisation of Jackson's dance influences, with Frost's Jackson dancing next to his inspired influences (the Fosse sequence was particularly evocative). Ashley Zhanghasa's Joseph, when not tormenting his real life brother playing his young adult son, lol, really pays off as a character in the "Thriller" sequence in the second half. That sequence alone was worth the price of the ticket. Myles Frost's breathy high-pitched coy world-weary line deliveries make for a very convincing Jackson, but it's in his dance moves that he is pure electric fire. This was a fun show, let down by a shallow book, lifted by some spectacular set pieces, making for entertainment to the tune of 4 stars for me.  |
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Mar 7, 2024 3:05:42 GMT
I found the first half less entertaining than "Thriller Live." YIKES! It was that bad?? |
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2024 7:00:39 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣
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Post by Steve on Mar 7, 2024 7:21:14 GMT
I found the first half less entertaining than "Thriller Live." YIKES! It was that bad?? To clarify, I'm talking about the gussied up version of "Thriller Live" after he passed away, not the original version, which I did not see. Some spoilers follow. . . And yes, if you are gonna spend tons of time talking rather than singing and dancing, I want more drama than omg-he's-such-a-perfectionist-he-spending-even-more-money-on-another-sleeve. The fact that Frost is a bang-on facsimile of Jackson is cool but not intrinsically dramatic. The reporters-might-report-too-much drama also doesn't rivet as it assumes we are desperate for those reporters to keep it a secret that MJ is on pills, and the audience has no reason to care about that. If they report it, it may actually help the poor bloke, after all, even if his fixers would prefer it to be kept secret. Obviously, it is tragic he took too many pain pills and we sigh about that, but sighing isn't riveting, and the show's attempt to ally us with the fixers against the reporters is a little icky. For me, only Daddy Joseph is a worthy antagonist in the extensive talk-talk-talk, and he's very much sidelined by the endless talk about the budget, which drama peaks with whether or not Jackson will mortgage Neverland, which frankly, I also couldn't care less about, as I already know, as we all do, that Jackson won't go broke (it's hardly a spoiler). The purpose of all this "drama" (pills and budget overruns) is to paint a portrait of perfectionism, how that results in peak craft and the toll it takes on the artist, but Jackson is always so damn calm about it all on stage, that we, the audience, can't be asked to be more bothered than he is. So, as Goldfinger said to Bond, we say, no Mr. Jackson, we don't expect you to talk, we expect you to dance. And in "Thriller Live," we had multiple Jacksons dance dance dancing nonstop. |
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Post by viserys on Mar 7, 2024 7:37:02 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣 It's this kind of toxic post that makes me want to engage less and less with this board, let alone post my thoughts and review. God beware anyone who might veer off the general consensus that Stephen Sondheim Is God, ALW is the Anti-Christ and that jukebox musicals are generally terrible rubbish? Can we just accept that tastes are different to begin with and that it is absolutely possible to both enjoy a highbrow piece from time to time AND some switch-your-brain-off fun show? |
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Post by Steve on Mar 7, 2024 7:53:26 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣 I love Mr. Barnaby, lol, but I bet you this production won't last as long as "Thriller Live" did, and the reason is that a lot of audiences, like me, also loved its endless action and topping itself. In MJ the Musical, the character of Michael says that the music is everything. That was the perfect description of what "Thriller Live" was about, rather than a laundry list of chitchat about budget additions, made one after the other after the other after the other. |
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Post by ceebee on Mar 7, 2024 9:27:08 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣 It's this kind of toxic post that makes me want to engage less and less with this board, let alone post my thoughts and review. God beware anyone who might veer off the general consensus that Stephen Sondheim Is God, ALW is the Anti-Christ and that jukebox musicals are generally terrible rubbish? Can we just accept that tastes are different to begin with and that it is absolutely possible to both enjoy a highbrow piece from time to time AND some switch-your-brain-off fun show? Totally agree. There is a snobbery on this board sometimes which is sometimes quite laughable as I bet there are quite a few people on here who have studied, worked on or attended a range of different productions. It is possible to love different genres. Surely theatre that gets bums on seats and people talking is a good thing? |
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Post by Dave B on Mar 7, 2024 9:37:44 GMT
If a comment with smileys after a seemingly clearly self-deprecating tongue in cheek comment is considered toxic... then I hope you don't read many other threads around here!  |
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Post by theatrefan62 on Mar 7, 2024 9:40:34 GMT
If a comment with smileys after a seemingly clearly self-deprecating tongue in cheek comment is considered toxic... then I hope you don't read many other threads around here! But that's not what that was? The comment referred to another posters comments, not ones made by Mr Barnaby themself, so it wasn't self-depreciating. And the laughing emojis usually mean laughing at something. |
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Post by Dave B on Mar 7, 2024 9:45:20 GMT
If a comment with smileys after a seemingly clearly self-deprecating tongue in cheek comment is considered toxic... then I hope you don't read many other threads around here! But that's not what that was? The comment referred to another posters comments, not ones made by Mr Barnaby themself, so it wasn't self-depreciating. And the laughing emojis usually mean laughing at something. Steve's original post says "(maybe the only one on this board lol)" which certainly reads as self-deprecating, tongue in cheek to me. So the context of Mr B's comment with the two smileys reads very differently IMO.
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2024 9:48:09 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣 I love Mr. Barnaby, lol, but I bet you this production won't last as long as "Thriller Live" did, and the reason is that a lot of audiences, like me, also loved its endless action and topping itself. In MJ the Musical, the character of Michael says that the music is everything. That was the perfect description of what "Thriller Live" was about, rather than a laundry list of chitchat about budget additions, made one after the other after the other after the other. MJ very may well not last as long as Thriller did- but then that was put on cheaply and is nowhere near as huge a production as this is. I would hate for you to take my remark seriously. You are clearly a passionate and discerning theatregoer |
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Post by ceebee on Mar 7, 2024 9:51:30 GMT
If a comment with smileys after a seemingly clearly self-deprecating tongue in cheek comment is considered toxic... then I hope you don't read many other threads around here! Perhaps that's the problem (genuinely). On other threads there have been pile-ons, nastiness, vindictive comments. Sometimes it isn't always easy for people to discern between genuine banter and a jibe or a poke. I'm not criticising Mr Barnaby - in fact I enjoy most of their posts! |
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Post by viserys on Mar 7, 2024 9:53:03 GMT
It was a JOKE… remember those? Steve is clearly a very discerning and passionate theatregoer. Exactly that's why I thought it was very strange you commented like you did. Given how many toxic comments you leave across various threads, it was not clear to me that this one was meant to be a joke, especially with the ROFL emojis that were added to it. To me, it's the winking emoji that conveys irony/a joke. Anyway, I apologize for misreading this particular situation, which doesn't change the fact that the general tone of the forum has become pretty toxic more recently. As I have no intention of seeing MJ, I'm outta this thread now  |
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Post by mrbarnaby on Mar 7, 2024 9:53:53 GMT
It was a JOKE… remember those? Steve is clearly a very discerning and passionate theatregoer. Exactly that's why I thought it was very strange you commented like you did. Given how many toxic comments you leave across various threads, it was not clear to me that this one was meant to be a joke, especially with the ROFL emojis that were added to it. To me, it's the winking emoji that conveys irony/a joke. Anyway, I apologize for misreading this particular situation, which doesn't change the fact that the general tone of the forum has become pretty toxic more recently. As I have no intention of seeing MJ, I'm outta this thread now Bye! |
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Post by BVM on Mar 7, 2024 11:06:34 GMT
I think any credibility went out the window when saying “I loved Thriller live” 🤣🤣 It's this kind of toxic post that makes me want to engage less and less with this board, let alone post my thoughts and review. God beware anyone who might veer off the general consensus that Stephen Sondheim Is God, ALW is the Anti-Christ and that jukebox musicals are generally terrible rubbish? Can we just accept that tastes are different to begin with and that it is absolutely possible to both enjoy a highbrow piece from time to time AND some switch-your-brain-off fun show? I do agree. There is certainly judgement on taste on here. #JusticeForBadCinderella |
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