Joining the previously announced Imelda Staunton, Andy Nyman and Jenna Russell in the West End production of Hello, Dolly! at the Adelphi Theatre this summer will be Clare Halse, Tyrone Huntley and Harry Hepple.
NEWS: Andy Nyman & Jenna Russell join the West End cast of Hello Dolly!
Andy Nyman and Jenna Russell are to join the cast of Hello, Dolly! when the iconic musical arrives at the Adelphi Theatre this summer.
Mind The Blog’s top five musical choices for 2020
If you’re struggling with all the choice, Mind The Blog has come up with her top five musicals you do not want to miss in 2020.
Love London Love Culture’s Show Picks for 2020
With a huge variety of shows having already been announced for this year, here Love London Love Culture selects some of the best ones for the year ahead….
Mind the Blog reflects on a theatre wish list for 2020
Mind the Blog has a fairly wide-ranging wish list of things I hope to see, including major shows such as Sunday in the Park with George, Evita, Magic Goes Wrong, Uncle Vanya and the Jamie Lloyd Company residency at the Playhouse Theatre.
NEWS: Imelda Staunton will headline new West End production of Hello, Dolly! in summer 2020
Imelda Staunton will star as Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly!, alongside Jenna Russell as Irene Molloy, in a brand new London production of the musical at the Adelphi Theatre in 2020.
‘Theatre has been the lodestar’: A Top 10 of Theatre in 2018
“The inheritance of wisdom, community and self” – Matthew Lopez. Each year, around March, I think of a brilliant way to start the Best of the Year list. Each year, around December, I forget it. In the year when football nearly came home and the UK has been stuck on a political pause, theatre has been the lodestar.
ON BROADWAY: ‘A heart-warming tale of simple humanity’ in HELLO, DOLLY! ★★★★★
The story of Hello, Dolly! may be froth and frolics, but underneath the razzle-dazzle of Jerry Herman’s songs and Michael Stewart’s book, there beats a heart-warming tale of simple humanity, which Bernadette Peters portrays exquisitely.
Never Mind The Blog, here’s January’s theatre news
Lots & lots of shows have their first performances in London and across the country this month, including new productions of Pinter’s The Birthday Party, Wilde’s Lady Windermere’s Fan, and Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well.
NEWS: Dear Evan Hansen wins big at the 2017 Tony Awards
The 71st annual Tony Awards were hosted by Kevin Spacey on 11 June 2017 at Radio City Music Hall. But who were the big winners of the evening? Dear Evan Hansen, that’s who!
FROM DOWN UNDER: Hello Dolly!
Look at the old girl now, fellas. Mrs Dolly Levi, born Gallagher, is back on the Melbourne stage in a glossy, if somewhat scaled down, production of Golden Age classic Hello, Dolly!.
JERRY’S GIRLS – Jermyn Street Theatre
Jermyn Street Theatre, London
****
Music and lyrics by Jerry Herman
Concepts by Larry Alford, Wayne Cilento and Jerry Herman
Directed by Kate Golledge
(l-r) Sarah-Louise Young, Emma Barton and Ria Jones
Drawn from the shows of Jerry Herman, Jerry’s Girls is a delightful cabaret that in the hands of three talented ladies, offers a whirl of show tunes that thoroughly deserves its hastily arranged return visit to Jermyn Street Emma Barton, Ria Jones and Sarah-Louise Young are magnificent throughout, working their way through a set list that was originally put together for a Broadway revue back in the 1980’s. The compilation is rarely seen over here and credit to producers Katy Lipson and Guy James for having the ingenuity to have mounted it so successfully.
With perhaps the exception of Milk and Honey, the numbers are all familiar to musical theatre lovers and the combination of gloriously powerful belts intermingled with moments of the purest poignancy make for an evening that would be an emotional rollercoaster were it not all so ridiculously enjoyable. All of Herman’s big shows get a look in, with Barton’s Mabel in Wherever He Ain’t channelling an exquisite vocal presence that also suggests just a hint of Albert Square! From the same show, Young and Jones give a gorgeous and perfectly weighted nuance to I Won’t Send Roses.
Herman’s humour sparkles, never wittier than in a song he wrote for the revue, Take It All Off, that wonderfully spoofs burlesque stripping. Again there is fabulous work from Young with Jones being disarmingly (and hilariously) self-deprecating as a stripper whose best years are behind her.
There are nods to Hello Dolly throughout, with the show ending on a powerful tribute to all that La Cage Aux Folles stood for. Grins along with lumps-in-throats all round.
Kate Golledge directs assuredly, with an entertaining eye for detail. Matthew Cole choreographs cleverly too given the venue’s intimacy and that Tap Your Troubles Away evolved into all three women tap-dancing, accompanied by pianist and MD Edward Court and his reed and mandolin playing partner Sophie Byrne on their feet too, (both fabulous musicians to boot) only added to the wondrous sparkle of the occasion. My one regret was not having discovered this gem of a show sooner so I could have had the opportunity to have returned to see it again.
Jerry’s Girls is only playing until May 31st. Barely lasting two hours, it offers West End entertainment at a fraction of a typical West End price. If you love what Broadway, Streisand, Merman & co were/are all about, then you’ll come out grinning. Go see this show!
Runs until 31st May