Growing up, my first experience of musicals was from a tape of Andrew Lloyd Webber songs that me and the family played in the car almost continuously the summer I turned 10. This was added to by VHS tapes of Cats, Joseph and his Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and the fiftieth birthday celebration which we owned. Once I went to university to study musical theatre I found a snobbery regarding these songs I had spent a childhood loving and there was an anger towards Lloyd Webber and his big musicals. So which is it? Is he an innovator and worthy of a statue in his honour, or is he to blame for an apparent decline in the quality of musicals?

Norman Lebrecht is very clear on where he stands regarding the composer: in his blog he claims that whilst Lloyd Webber may know how to sell a show he “has trashed down the genre to a series of musical clichés and pop tunes”. Whilst I might agree that Lloyd Webber’s influence on scale and technology is evident, I disagree that he has caused musical theatre to be a form “that barely engages the brain”. Lloyd Webber is merely one facet of a widespread genre. It is still a predominantly American theatrical form and, in their hands, engaging and thought-provoking musicals abound. However, I also believe that British writers can be up there, too, if given the chance to nurture their shows. Lebrecht also harks back to the early musicals that sat between grand opera and low brow music hall. We have now lost the music hall tradition and as such new parameters have been set; I could argue that musical theatre has merely expanded to hold the middle ground as well as filling a niche in the more low brow entertainment.

In regards to this statue I do agree it is a mistake in so far as it comes across as very narcissistic. Regardless of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s involvement, there is an arrogance around a statue of a someone still alive. I believe they mean more when given retrospectively and in memorial of a life. Who knows what Lloyd-Webber might still do? He may squander everything and we won’t want to have a memorial to him, or he may produce his best work yet. Additionally, if Broadway is not giving Harold Prince or Stephen Sondheim statues then Lloyd Webber doesn’t deserve his yet, either. What I would agree on though is that he should have one at some point because, love him or hate him, there is no denying he has brought audiences to musical theatre and helped place the West End in the history books of musical theatre.

Therefore, whilst I agree a statue may be apt I believe it premature to erect one just yet. All I really know for sure though is that if a statue is put up it won’t cause me to want to leave the country like Lebrecht.

Photo by Flickr user Robert Couse-Baker under a Creative Commonc Licence.

Sarah Green

Sarah is a musical theatre graduate now studying for her Masters in theatre practice with hopes of going onto a PHD. She has been writing for A Younger Theatre since September 2011 on all things musical theatre related.

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So this is perhaps my guiltiest pleasure musical of the moment, but who doesn’t love a cast of athletic men singing and dancing their faces off? The show is a Disney Theatrical Productions show and as such my excitability is playing right into the hands of the corporate machine, but let’s be honest, I have been doing that since I spent my childhood singing along to Andrew Lloyd Webber songs in the car and I regret nothing.

The show is based on the 1992 cult classic Newsies, with music by Alan Menken and Jack Feldman, and details the Newsboys Strike of 1889. They have re-arranged the songs from the film as well as adding new material. The original Broadway production transferred from the off-Broadway Papermill Playhouse in 2012 and lost out on the Tony Award for Best Musical to Once (a worthy winner). However, it did win for choreography (which is no great surprise if you have seen these boys tumble, spin and tap their way through the show) and for Best Original Score. What I also liked about the production and how they generally work in New York is that you go through open auditions as part of the casting; there is less need for an agent to submit you for work. Therefore, the majority of the young cast had their Broadway debuts when their show transferred to The Nederlander in March 2012. Even when it transferred it was only for a limited run, which they extended, before announcing in May 2012 that the show now had an open-ended engagement.

So as the show prepares to transfer to London in spring 2014, I was very excited to read that they held open auditions in June for the show. Whilst you do need to have strong technical dance ability and be able to sing well, you also need a playing age of 16-22. So there is a chance a young performer, who might find it difficult to break into the industry, will have gone and shone at these auditions. So say whatever you want about the ethics of commercial theatre and big corporations like Disney, but it is hard not to be excited at the possibility of nurturing young talent. Plus, it’s hard to ignore yet another show promoting dance and masculinity – seriously I’m going to need a fan or a hose when I watch it live next year.

My only concern is perhaps that British performers won’t be at the same level. I’m not sure what they feed them on in America, but some of the US cast seem almost superhuman in what they can do. This video of their Tony award performance last year is proof of that, particularly Ryan Steele as Specs (stripy shirt and glasses) who, for any nerdy fact gatherers, is now in the original Broadway cast of Matilda. I do hope it is a surprise hit here as it was for Broadway despite its very New York story and I am excited to see the casting for the London production.

Photo by Flickr user Ashley Rehnblom under a Creative Commons Licence. 

Sarah Green

Sarah is a musical theatre graduate now studying for her Masters in theatre practice with hopes of going onto a PHD. She has been writing for A Younger Theatre since September 2011 on all things musical theatre related.

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If you do not know who Patti LuPone is, it is quite possible that you have been living on a different planet for the past 30 years. Broadway and West End star LuPone originated some of the greatest roles that musical theatre has to offer, including Eva Peron in Evita and Fantine in the original London cast of Les Miserables. 

LuPone’s piano player and Broadway journalist Seth Rudetsky takes the stage first, warming up the crowd with his great videos of Tonys and Variety performances from the past. He rips into everyone, from Andrew Rannells in Book Of Mormon to Patti LuPone herself. But his stories are much funnier because he has actually talked to the stars about their onstage goofs. Rudetsky’s videos make the crowd roar with laughter, and it is a great warm up for the night of Broadway classics ahead.

It is a different set up than the typical West End show, it is feels more like a night out with Patti. She takes the stage, sipping water out of a wine glass, and she tells the audience about her stories from her incredible career. She takes about everything, from her “camera rant” in Gypsy when an audience member had a rapid flash camera and started taking pictures, to how she got the role in Evita. The greatest thing about LuPone is that she does not hold back, either, she lets everybody know that she did not originally want the role as Eva Peron and she is still convinced that Andrew Lloyd Webber hates women because of it.

But of course, it is the music that everybody has come for. There is no fancy set up for this show, just a piano and a vase full of flowers on top to make it look pretty. But LuPone shows that she does not need that fancy set up, all she needs is her voice. Rudetsky puts her on the spot many times, asking to perform songs that she has not seen the lyrics for since she first performed them, but she takes the challenge on like a trooper, and knocks it so far out of the ball park she hits a satellite up in space. You usually find that Broadway legends tend to have a bit of a wear on their voices after years of performing, but not LuPone! She can still all of her songs in the original key (even if she does protest to Rudetsky not to, but all he says is higher!) and it is absolutely flawless.

The highlight of the show was the Les Miserables segment of the show. Patti grabs an audience member from the crowd to sing Valjean’s part in Les Miserables‘s ’Come To Me’, and the audience member gets into it, closing Patti’s eyes in a Jean Valjean-esque manner, earning the most laughs of the show. However, all the laughs are stopped when the opening keys for ‘I Dreamed A Dream’ start. The house comes to a complete stand still: fanboys are crying, hearts skipped a beat, and even LuPone started to cry when she sang the famous “Life has killed the dream I dreamed” line. Never have I seen a crowd go so wild in my life.

Patti LuPone’s show is an absolute must-see for any lover of musical theatre or just great music in general. With a different set list every night, the fans will be getting a true one-of-a-kind experience with LuPone. We do not need to tell you how great it is, you have to go down to see it yourself because there are just no words to describe this amazing experience.

Patti Lupone is playing at Leicester Square Theatre until 23 June 2013. For more information and tickets, see The Leicester Square Theatre website.

Lucy Cave

Lucy is a 2nd year Media Writing student living in South East London. When she's not blogging you can find her working on her scripts or novel.

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It took me a while to warm to Maria Friedman’s production of Merrily We Roll Along. At first I didn’t quite get it. I was bemused rather than enthralled, as song after song appeared to fall by the wayside, seemingly surplus to requirements. I remembered reading that when Merrily debuted on the Broadway stage in 1981 it closed after just 16 performances, and I feared that I now understood why. Merrily’s many musical numbers appeared to pause the action, clumsily placed in between dialogue rather than acting as a vehicle to drive the plot forward.

Never have I experienced such a conversion mid-show; the stylised ‘tits and teeth’ so ably performed by the entire ensemble melted my cynicism and I finally understood the meaning, message and method of Merrily. This production is undeniably naff in places, but deliberately so; it revels in its high camp, it is self-empowered by the knowledge that the audience is in on the joke. If this is cheese, then it is a high-quality gorgonzola, epitomised best by numbers such as ‘Old Friends’ in Act I and ‘The Blob’ in Act II.

Merrily is set backwards in time; the action starts in the 1970s, where we meet the embittered composer Frank Shepard, whose penthouse and collection of hangers-on masks his pain and unhappiness at the compromises he has made to his art. Alongside Frank is the grouchy Mary Flynn, now apparently reliant on alcohol, whose razor tongue is still able to burst any pretence of pomp and ceremony. Notable by his absence is Frank’s one-time musical partner, the lyricist Charley Kringas. From this low point, the action retreats to the successes and first signs of trouble in the 1960s, to the early days of idealism and excitement in the late 1950s. The fact that Merrily ends on such a high, with the future looking so bright for the trio, lends the piece a thoroughly tragic undertone, the audience streaming out of the Harold Pinter Theatre leave feeling both nourished and empty at the same time.

With such boisterous energy from the entire cast, it may feel a little mean-spirited to pick out any for particular praise, yet Jenna Russell, who impressed so much during her turn in Soho Cinders at the Soho Theatre last summer, appears in her element as ‘Noo Yoiker’ Mary, effortlessly demanding attention without ever stealing scenes. Mark Umbers as Frank and Josefina Gabrielle as the feisty Broadway star Gussie Carnegie are reunited here after they last shared the stage in the excellent Sweet Charity down the road at the Haymarket a couple of seasons ago. Both provide solidly gutsy performances.  Clare Foster is sweet as Frank’s ex-wife Beth, and proves her musical theatre worth with her solo song ‘Not A Day Goes By’.

This is multi-Olivier winning Maria Friedman’s professional directorial debut, which she compares to “one big game of Sudoku… There are so many elements that need to fit together”. Friedman, a good friend of musical theatre royalty Stephen Sondheim, who has provided the music and lyrics, excels in her transfer from on-stage to off; indeed, this could be the start of something very exciting, especially if little sister Sonia remains on-hand as producer.

A final word has to be said about hair and costume: at times garish, with emphasis on mid-60s Op-Art fashion, at times stylish, with sleek lines and fitted jackets, but always witty and laced with meaning. It is clear that Merrily’s talented wardrobe team have had as much fun as the rest of the company.

Behind the greasepaint and choreography (most impressive incidentally, at the opening of Act II), there is a poignancy in Merrily We Roll Along. It says more than it originally lets on. There is a wisdom amongst the silliness. This is where Merrily’s power lies. It took me a while to become immersed into Merrily’s world. But I’m very glad I did.

Merrily We Roll Along is on at the Harold Pinter Theatre until 27 July. For more information and tickets see the Official West End Merrily We Roll Along website. Production image by Tristram Kenton.

Daniel Harrison

A graduate of Theatre Studies, Daniel has worked in a number of different areas within theatre, most recently cutting his teeth with the Communications team at BAC. He is currently Project Assistant for the Young Vic's upcoming Schools Theatre Festival, and is a champion of the power of theatre as a force for good within society.

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