Hairspray

[burntcopper]

Saw Hairspray.

It is cheesy, corny, as shallow as a puddle and waaaaay too much fun. Brilliant voices and performance, dance routines of the fun, terribly infectious tunes, second half is better than the first (better put together and has the better tunes - audience was laughing like drains and cheering constantly). Special mention, to, uh, the entire set of leads and second leads. Leanne Jones as Tracy, Michael Ball as her mum, Ian Watson as her dad, Ben Ellis as Link Larkin, Adrian Hansel as Seaweed, Elinor Collett as Penny, Tracie Bennett as Velma von Tussle , Rachael Wooding as Amber, Johnnie Fiori as Motormouth Maybelle...

Michael Ball in drag and a fat suit is... wow. Utterly, utterly fabulous and glorious in a way I've only seen Ian McKellen in a Biba minidress be. Only funnier and immersed in the character as the character. Oh, and you *believed* that the Turnblad parents were completely in love and having a fantastic sex life. There's a song in the second half which is sweet, tender, and filthy as hell. And Ian Watson cracked up near the end of it when they were hugging and couldn't stop laughing (audience were already laughing their heads off whilst going 'awwwww') and then Michael Ball started ad-libbing on top of it. Leanne Jones : hee. great at physical comedy, as is the entire cast. Girl playing her best mate? It takes special talent to be out of step with the entire cast during every single dance number - and have to go the wrong way on half the moves. Ben Ellis. Good singer (and has got rid of that weird lisp thing he did on ADWD), he's playing an incredibly cheesy shallow character, but wow. Stage presence much? Not to mention dear god that boy can dance. Very long legs, kindly stop doing that with your hips, and the black kids (especially Seaweed) are supposed to be better dancers than Link Larkin. Tone it down. :ponders: So, if we can get Chris Ellis-Stanton (more classical with added tap) *and* him on the stage together, would anyone mind that their brains dribbled out of their ears because they couldn't take their eyes off these boys' hips?

Stage door : Big crowd. Giggly and bouncy crowd. Utterly *polite*, non-pushy crowd. Yeah. You heard me. All the actors were in a good mood, they stopped and chatted, they signed, they posed. They also have pink sharpies. I want pink sharpies. (and once again I had to lend my sharpie out) Ian informed me that the reason he cracked up was Michael whispered something utterly filthy in his ear. Johnnie was really pleased we were all gushing over her - and when we asked 'didn't you hear the cheering for your song?' (second act, torch song), she apparently *doesn't* hear the cheering because she's so caught up in it emotionally and trying not to cry because she's thinking of her granddad. Leanne is a complete, complete sweetheart, was really nervous about the Stiles and Drewe concert and was pleased to hear that she didn't come off as awkward - and there's an album due to come out near christmas. Not quite sure if it was of that concert or just Soho Cinderella, but still, yay! Michael's lovely. Ben was not-quite mobbed as he was first out, and I was on near eye-roll of 'agh, Joseph fangirls' but entire crowd stayed for everyone else and squeed just as much over everyone else.

Comments

[fairyd123.livejournal.com]

I have to give so much props to the script writers and the actors for the fact that the corpsing scene during You're Timeless to Me is written into the script, performed at every performance - and yet everyone always mentions it. That's pretty impressive to keep it that fresh.

Johnni is awesome - when I saw her she sang some of the Muses songs from Hercules to me and I nearly keeled over.

Ben has great stage presence and is a killer dancer but I'm still not at all convinced about the voice.

[burntcopper.livejournal.com]

REALLY? You're kidding me. Christ. that is just... wow. it looked like the best case of panto actors when they're messing around.

She did the muses? Daaaammmmn.

it's a good voice, though. not, say, Daniel calibre, but I liked it better than Keith's when they did 'Starlight Express', but it might be my preference for type of voice.

[eruvadhril.livejournal.com]

Michael Ball... woah, Marius? Seriously? What was his pretending-to-be-a-woman voice like?

[burntcopper.livejournal.com]

Yup. Very convincing - not at all like a panto dame. He played it as a woman. Not a bloke pretending to be a woman. Keeping accent on his singing voice too, from what I remember. So much so that when I had a listen to the tracks they've got on the UK Hairspray site (still the US version, *when* do we get the West End cast?) I was really put off because Mama Turnblad was... deep and gravelly. No. Just... no. Didn't help that Leanne has a smoother voice than Marisa (Broadway Tracy) too.

Avenue Q all over again, where the only versions I like to listen to are the UK bootlegs.