Last Tuesday evening (18th
October) me and my sister Fern went to see The Sound of Music at the NorwichTheatre Royal. Before we start I would like to dedicate this post to Charmian Carr
who recently passed away; Carr played Liesl in the film version. I know the
show has now moved on from Norwich and I apologise about my tardiness with this
post. I have recently moved into a new house and am still waiting for my
internet connection to be up and running and what with the hectic move and
still recently into a new job, it has caused problems with being able to write
and post. However, enough with my issues on with the blog. I have to start with
a caveat; I am the biggest fan of the film version of The Sound of Music. It
has been my favourite film since a very young age and I spent most of my early
childhood weekends watching the film over and over again. At one point I
watched the ‘So Long, Farewell’ scene so many times that the video was
distorted in this section. Well now I have a DVD version which is great, so
long as it doesn’t get scratched. I hadn’t seen a stage version of the show
until last Christmas, I believe it was ITV who aired a live filmed production,
based on the original 1959 stage production, naturally I was very excited. You
can imagine my face when I witnessed how different the stage show is from the
film. If you are someone of a similar position to mine and a huge fan of the
film you may be slightly disappointed with the stage show as there are multiple
differences. For example the song order is different, some songs are sang in
different formats by different people, different characters say different
things and there seems to be a bigger political theme in the stage show.
This production ran for a week at
the Norwich Theatre Royal and I am aware that the subsequent performances from
my show were sold out which is great news. The audience absolutely loved the
show and a deserved standing ovation was delivered at the end of the
performance, which me and the sis were a part of. Lucy O’Byrne (possibly best
known as runner-up in The Voice UK) plays Maria Rainer. I have to say her voice
was not the best for me and seemed less powerful than some of her fellow cast
members. Again I refer to my caveat earlier in this post, being a mega fan of
Julie Andrews I don’t think anyone can and will ever play the role like she,
and like any musical character each actor or actress brings their own stamp to
any role. I just think the role of Maria has been given a huge stamp by Andrews
no one will ever live up to this role. My sister said she liked her voice and
the typical songs Maria sings which we used to simulate as children, of course
mas as Maria.
Captain von Trapp is played by
Coronation Street’s Frank Foster, real name Andrew Lancel. I was not blown away
by his performance but it wasn’t bad in anyway. I particularly enjoyed the
singing performance of the Mother Abbess played by Jan Hartley and her
rendition of ‘Climb Ev’ry Mountain’ made me go tingly. It was interesting to
read that Hartley originally played Maria in a subsequent production in the
West End which I thought was a great coincidence. I also really loved Lucy Van
Gasse as Baroness (Elsa) Schraeder who gave a great performance both vocally
and visually, she gives the Baroness that mean stance yet sings beautifully.
Those who have only seen the film will be saying the Baroness doesn’t sing,
well she has two songs in the stage version which is one of the things that
would have been nice to keep in the film, I particularly loved the song ‘How
Can Love survive?’ which should be downloaded by any Sound of Music fan who hasn’t
seen the stage show. Comedic performance of the night has to go to Howard
Samuels who plays Max Detweiler, although Max seems much more camp in the stage
version compared to film Max.
The Children were good and got some
very positive and warm reactions from the audience, especially little Gretl (I
can just see my niece playing her). The constant of the children is Annie
Holland who plays Liesl, a very good dancer with the ‘Sixteen Going On Seventeen’
number with her partner Kane Verrall playing Rolf. I am not sure if the rest of
the child cast were played by a touring group of children or local children. I
know some touring productions of musicals use local children whereas others use
a touring child cast who stay with the show. I think I know who the children
were played by in the performance I saw but if I get it wrong I am very sorry.
I think any child actor gathering the guts to get on stage and sing and dance
deserves a mention in any write up of a show. So here goes: Louis Rice plays Friedrich;
Grace Fox plays Louisa; Joe Hubbard-Bateman plays Kurt; Lucy Grant plays
Brigitta; Emily Daw plays Marta; and, Alana Willis plays Gretl.
I haven’t given a history of TheSound of Music like I do in many of my other posts, I think because I just
assume everyone knows what the story is. If not Wikipedia is there for everyone
to use, no point me just re-typing using different words. What I will do is pay
tribute to one of the most loved and talented musical writers in history,
Rodgers and Hammerstein. Clearly The Sound of Music is my favourite RandD
musical. Why? I hear you all shout. Well it is down to the joyful, loving and
inspirational music (Richard Rodgers) and lyrics (Oscar Hammerstein II) created.
With classics including the title song, ‘Do-Re-Mi’, ‘My Favourite Things’, ‘The
Lonely Goatherd’, ‘Maria’, ‘Edelweiss’ as
well as those already mentioned, The sound of Music becomes one of the most
well-loved musicals of all time. I am sure a recent poll had it at number 2. Unfortunately
the stage show does not include ‘I Have Confidence’ as this was written for the
film and after the untimely death of Hammerstein and Rodgers wrote this song
alone.
Bill Kenwright’s production of The
Sound of Music continues to tour the UK and is set to visit The New Wimbledon
Theatre before it finishes. Coming up at the Norwich Theatre Royal is a ballet version of Beauty and the Beast, Breakfast
at Tiffany’s, The Commitments, Chicago and of course this year’s panto which is Jack and the Beanstalk starring some of last year's favourites. For information on tickets either visit the website or call the
box office on 01603 63 00 00. This has been a fantastic year for the Theatre
Royal and I just know 2017 is going to be even better. Please get in touch on
twitter AaronBurgess89
