UK Theatre Network

The Lady Boys of Bangkok: Fur Coats and French Knickers Tour – The Sabai Pavilion, Newcastle

Amongst a myriad of marketing and a plethora of publicity, The Lady Boys of Bangkok are back on Tyneside for the eighth year in a row. So, get set for a fantastic fun-filled evening of frivolity, right? Wrong!

The diamante still dazzles and the sequins still sparkle but all that glistens is not gold and the performances and material are distinctly lack-lustre in the dubiously entitled Fur Coats and French Knickers. Having been an annual fixture on the revue circuit for thirteen years now, it seems that the lack of luck associated with the superstitious number has rubbed off on this poorly-conceived and disastrously-executed production.

Billed as ‘an irresistible mixture of comedy, cabaret and raunchy capers’, it couldn’t be further from the mark. The ‘comedy’ is more akin to the sort of smuttiness that would usually be associated with the seaside postcards of Donald McGill or the ‘Carry On’ films and sexual innuendo is laboriously employed in the hope of getting a cheap laugh from the sparse crowd.

As usual, well-known figures are lampooned by the Lady Boys in an effort to keep the show topical, contemporary and fresh. This year saw Peter Andre and Katie Price get the treatment but, rather than being satirical, it was contrived and banal. And, I have to say, I have never seen a worse ‘homage’ to Marilyn Monroe – complete with five o’clock shadow and underarm hair!

For those who don’t know, most of the entertainment comes in the form of the cast miming to well-known girlie anthems from some of pops biggest divas. However, the lip-synching was embarrassingly adrift and many of the group didn’t seem to even know the lyrics of the tracks they were performing to! What’s more, the ‘performers’ – and I use the term in the loosest sense of the word – lethargically walked-through the choreography with barely an ounce of effort or enthusiasm.

In comparison to the slick and stylish blend of burlesque and Broadway that is being delivered by Betty ‘Legs’ Diamond, just across the road at Boulevard, The Lady Boys of Bangkok look nothing more than a troupe of tacky Thai transvestites in a tent. Not so much Lady Boys as Lady Bores!

Steve Burbridge.

Runs until Saturday 8th October 2011.

Corrie!

Darlington Civic Theatre

In 1960, the genius and passion of Tony Warren gave birth to a national treasure. Fifty years later, Jonathan Harvey should be tried for attempted murder.

As the familiar Coronation Street theme tune, composed by the late Eric Spear, filled the auditorium I was looking forward to Corrie! being an affectionate pastiche of Britain’s longest-running and, arguably, best-loved soap. Instead, what followed was a preposterous parody.

A mish-mash of montages were ‘cobbled’ together to give a cringe-worthy potted history of many of the most significant events to have taken place in Weatherfield during the past half a century. Although I never expected this ‘brand new play’, which has been ‘specially commissioned by ITV’ to feed the culture-vulture within me, even Jack Duckworth’s pigeons would have been hard-pushed to find a tasty morsel in this contrived concoction of crass caricatures and sensational scene send-ups.

If, as the programme notes claim, ‘Coronation Street was also part of the great wave of ‘kitchen sink drama’ of the 1950s’ then Corrie! has slid down the drain and come to rest in the gutter where it belongs.

Although I do not dispute the fact that the six actors on stage, Leanne Best, Simon Chadwick, Daniel Crowder, Jo Mousley, Peter Temple and Lucy Thackeray, work extremely hard playing a total of 55 characters between them – often in very quick succession – my gripe is that the mannerisms of each character were so exaggerated that they became less recognisable as a result. Thus, the performances contained enough ham to keep Alf’s Mini Market stocked for the next fifty years!

 

I also took umbrage with iconic characters such as Bet, Blanche, Audrey, Emily, Martha and Minnie being played by blokes. Despite the fact that there was an element of drag queen/panto dame to Bet, Julie Goodyear’s television performance, combined with some brilliant scripts, always ensured that behind the beehive, leopard-skin and dangly earrings we knew there was a real woman. This did not come across on stage.

Furthermore, Corrie! is described as ‘a new play’ but, in essence, it is not. Most of the scenes are performed as they were originally written, using the same dialogue that the original scriptwriters penned. Only the words of the narrator, who is played by a genuine Coronation Street actor at each performance (in this case it was Ken Morley, aka Reg Holdsworth), are original – and my guess is that even they were scribbled down on the back of a Newton & Ridley beer mat during a ten-minute tea break from Baldwin’s Casuals.

I am not sure who Jonathan Harvey has pitched Corrie! at, to be honest. After all, those who hate the soap wouldn’t pay to go to the theatre to see a stage play based upon it and those who love it will surely consider this offering as sacrilege. Indeed, I suspect the show would make their hair curl faster than a last-minute cancellation at Audrey’s salon.

Whereas Coronation Street could be best described as a quality soap that is able to produce a frothy lather, Corrie! is a cheap imitation that leaves a scummy residue ingrained in your mind.

Steve Burbridge.

Runs at Darlington until Saturday 7 May 2011, then tours to Ipswich, Northampton, Bradford, Southampton, Stoke, Brighton, Hull and Malvern.

The Lady Boys of Bangkok: Fantasy & Feathers Tour

Sabai Pavilion, Times Square, Newcastle

They’ve returned to the ‘toon’ for the seventh successive year and are proving more popular than ever before. Yes, The Lady Boys of Bangkok are back by public demand and entertaining audiences with their own unique brand of burlesque, cabaret and revue.

The Fantasy and Feathers production encompasses sexy space-themed numbers, sensuous Latin rhythms and pulsating pop hits by Tina Turner, Madonna, Lady Gaga and The Saturdays. There’s even a side-splitting Britain’s Got Talent/X-Factor sketch, with appearances by Jedward, SuBo and Cheryl Cole (who waves the red card at her wandering ex, Ashley!). A tongue-in-cheek tribute is paid to the late great prince of pop, Michael Jackson, too.

A hallmark of the show is the traditional element of audience participation and, as usual, the artistes descended into the auditorium to locate an unsuspecting male . . . or three! It’s all done in a good-humoured style and the guys seemed to enjoy their moment in the limelight.

With just about a million quids worth of absolutely stunning costumes, painstakingly-applied make up and show-stopping choreography, it’s difficult to believe that the gorgeous ‘girls’ on stage are actually all men.

The show is two hours of terrific entertainment, performed with perfect precision and plenty of panache. It’s an irresistible, irrepressible evening that guarantees a great night out!

Steve Burbridge.

Runs until Saturday 9 October 2010.

Stop Messing About

Darlington Civic Theatre

Perhaps I’m just jaded by General Election fatigue, but as Stop Messing About got underway at Darlington Civic Theatre, I could have sworn that David Cameron, Nigel Farage from UKIP and Jeremy Paxman took to the stage for a game of alpha-male political ping-pong. Jolted back to my senses, I realised that it was by pure coincidence that Charles Armstrong, Robin Sebastian and Nigel Harrison bear uncanny resemblances to the afore-mentioned politicians and interviewer!

That moment of madness having been resolved, I settled back to watch the show. Essentially, Stop Messing About is borne of a simple – or perhaps lazy? – concept. It is a theatre show that recreates the recording of two episodes of the radio sketch show series that starred Kenneth Williams, Joan Sims and Hugh Paddick.

Liz Cooke has designed a set that is authentically evocative of a BBC recording studio, complete with light-up ‘Applause’ signs and lollipop microphones, which goes quite some way to help the nostalgia start to flow.

The cast, led by the brilliantly talented Robin Sebastian as Kenneth Williams, are top-notch throughout and there is a fantastic sense of camaraderie between them. Although, as hard as they work, India Fisher (Joan Sims) and Nigel Harrison (Hugh Paddick) are far outshone by Sebastian’s uncanny impersonation of the legendary Williams. Everything about his performance is perfect – the facial expressions, the mannerisms, and, most importantly, the voice.

The script, penned by Brian Cooke and Johnnie Mortimer, is peppered with double entendres and littered with cliché, but that, as well as being all part of the fun, is synonymous with Williams’s trade-mark Carry On style humour. Despite some wonderful one-liners, it is the stuff that generates chuckles rather than belly laughs, though.

Whilst I do acknowledge the many strengths of this production – the performances, direction, set design and script being amongst them – I cannot understand why the producers believe that a piece of entertainment which was intended for the radio audiences of the 1960s would lend itself to theatre audiences in the twenty-first century. Answers on a postcard, please?

Steve Burbridge.

Runs until Saturday 8^th May 2010.

The composer-parodist Mark Bunyan presents his new revue Unburied Treasures at the Rosie. His new show is directed by Karen Rabinowitz who also choreographed Bunyan’s musical Just Good Friends. The mood of the revue is set by the stage design – a black coffin with flowers is sitting on a platform. We soon learn from Jo and Mo (Haydn and Mozart) in a cheerful song that they became victims of posthumous decapitation - their heads were stolen by phrenologists eager to study the bumps on their skulls. Macabre indeed – and very funny! The show features the posthumous adventures of famous corpses from Christopher Columbus to Evita, with appearances by Errol Flynn, Mozart, Haydn, Daniel Boone, Shelley, David Livingstone and others along the way. The talented cast is comprised of Adam Walker, Jack Summers, James Smoker, Jessica Sherman and Tom McLean play the dead celebs with gusto and sing their hearts out for the dead in songs like Happy in Hollywood, Lincoln – A Melodrama, and The Bones of Boone. Musical direction by Peter Wilson.

April – 9 May, Tue – Sat 7.30 pm, Sun 3.00 pm
Tickets: £ 12 / £ 10 (concessions)
BOX OFFICE: 020 7704 6665The Rosemary Branch, 2 Shepperton Road, London N1 3DT

Adolf Hitler: My Part In His Downfall

Darlington Civic Theatre

Adapted from six volumes of his wartime memoirs, by Ben Power and Tim Carroll, Spike Milligan’s Adolf Hitler: My Part In His Downfall chronicles his experiences between September 1939 and March 1944. Rather than being performed as a play, it adopts the format of an ENSA-type revue with whimsical sketches, monologues, and musical numbers.

This is effective to the extent that the audience is treated to gems from the era including ‘Lily Marlène’, ‘I’ve Got A Gal In Kalamazoo’, ‘Chattanooga Choo Choo’ and ‘Pennies From Heaven’.

The cast of five – Sholto Morgan (Spike), Dominic Gerrard (Edgington) William Findley (Goldsmith), David Morley Hale (Kidgell) and Matthew Devereaux (MC) - are certainly a talented bunch and they perform with vigour and enthusiasm. Indeed, Sholto Morgan in his first professional role demonstrates a great deal of future promise.

The humour, as you might guess, veers towards the surreal and, often, downright zany - having said that, much of it passed me by. I should probably have known it would. After all, Milligan is the comedy hero of a twit who talks to his plants and prefers a woman who looks like Audrey Roberts from Coronation Street to the beauty of the late Diana, Princess of Wales. I fear for the future of the monarchy!

The transitions between sketches are anything but slick and there is much moving of props by very visible stage hands, which tends to detract from one’s possible engagement with the piece. A further annoyance and distraction came from four people in the row in front of me whose sole purpose was to rustle and crinkle sweet wrappers continually and disturb everyone else in the vicinity, rather than to watch the show.

Not even the exaggerated promise of bad language, themes of an adult nature and nudity were enough to get me through this dismal production.

Steve Burbridge.

Christmas with the Rat Pack

Darlington Civic Theatre

‘Tis the season to be jolly . . . and to be surrounded by wall-to-wall panto! But, before all that begins in earnest, Christmas with The Rat Pack is a very welcome deviation on the festive theme.

As the title suggests, the show treats audiences to an evening of the music of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. Now in its tenth year, the appeal of this production is obvious – it’s slick, stylish and sensational.

Stephen Rashbrook, Mark Halliday and Matt Henry perform as Frank, Dean and Sammy, respectively, and they are joined by Robyn Currell, Nikki Stokes and Rachel Parrott as the Burrelli Sisters.

After beginning with a string of swing hits including Almost Like Being In Love, I’ve Got You Under My Skin and That Old Black Magic Called Love, the tone takes a seasonal turn and classic Christmas songs are integrated into the proceedings.

The performances are top-notch; each of the guys looks and sounds like the legend they are portraying, and there is a wonderful rapport between them. Some scripted ‘comedy patter’ entertains the audience between numbers and it is executed in a way that looks completely spontaneous.

The auditorium was pretty much full on press night, which bodes well for the rest of the week, proving that it is possible to present a seasonal show without having to have the audience shout out: ‘It’s behind you!’

Steve Burbridge.

‘Christmas with The Rat Pack runs at Darlington until Saturday 28 November 2009.

The Lady Boys of Bangkok: Mile High

Although it may seem hard to believe, a tiny slice of Bangkok’s exotic nightlife has been transported from Thailand to Tyneside. Nestled in the heart of Newcastle city centre is the Sabai Pavilion, the venue that, for the next four weeks, is playing host to The Lady Boys of Bangkok.

Back to wow the crowds for a fifth year, the show is sassier, sexier and more sensational than ever before. Inspired by the world of aviation, the Mile High show even boasts its own plane.

The cabaret show encompasses elements of burlesque, revue and variety and is performed by sixteen of the world’s most beautiful showgirls – all of whom just happen to be men.

It is a raunchy, risqué and riotous party night that is packed full of the feel-good factor. Where else could you expect to see divas including Shirley Bassey, Kylie Minogue, Girls Aloud and the Nolan’s sharing the same stage?

The thing that puts this drag show above all others is the sheer professionalism that is evident throughout. From the show-stopping choreography to the stunning costumes, the painstakingly applied make-up to the well-drilled routines, the Lady Boys are masters of their art and know just how to give their audience exactly what they want.

The atmosphere is electric, particularly during the numbers that are performed to disco anthems including ‘It’s Raining Men’, ‘Dancing Queen’ and ‘I’m In The Mood For Dancing.’

The production is, quite simply, a dazzling display of glitz, glamour and great entertainment that has the crowd whooping, screaming and cheering their appreciation.

‘The Lady Boys of Bangkok: Mile High’ runs at The Sabai Pavilion in Newcastle upon Tyne until Saturday 10^th October 2009.

Bobby Pattinson and Friends

The Customs House, South Shields, Tyne & Wear

Friday 6^th March 2009

The North East’s own comedy legend, Bobby Pattinson, made a triumphant return to The Customs House last night and confirmed his status as ‘The Godfather of Geordie Comedy’ with a sensational sell-out show.

Bobby, a tireless charity fund-raiser, is a spritely seventy-five year old with the gift of the gab and a mischievous twinkle in his eye. His gigs are always popular with audiences who revel in the type of entertainment that was once the staple of Clubland for decades, but is now, sadly, all too rare.

The evening was packed full of entertainment that included songs, impressions and cabaret. The first guest to join Bobby on stage was guitarist and singer Dave Black who, it was revealed, turned down an offer in the 80s to join a new band. Having spent many years on the road, Dave declined and recommended one of his music students. The student was John Taylor and the band became Duran Duran! That’s showbiz.

Black demonstrated his talents with performances including Fields of Gold, Abracadabra and Rockin’ All Over The World. The dance troupe, ‘The Dolly Rockers’ provided the ‘showgirls’ element with some fantastic choreographed routines.

Comedian and singer Paul Squire had the audience eating from his hand with his mix of jokes, impressions and ballads. His jokes about Geordies were particularly well-received, proving that, here in the North East, we don’t mind laughing at ourselves.

The final guest was Radio Newcastle presenter and comedian Alfie Joey and he was a huge hit with the audience. His impressions of Bruce Forsyth and Michael Crawford were only surpassed by his witty and satirical swipe at George Bush and Tony Blair’s ‘special relationship.’

The show was, quite simply, three hours of laughter and song performed by a group of great entertainers. However, as marvellous as his guests may have been, it was the slick septogenarian who really brought the house down. Long reign, King Bobby!

Steve Burbridge.