London Part 2 – Shrek
Ahhh yes, the moment we had been waiting for. Well, *I* had been waiting for!
After seeing so many clips from Shrek, The Musical on youtube, it was my biggest wish to see it in person. Jumped for joy when I heard it was opening in London and couldn’t wait to book tickets.
The musical itself went through different stages in the US, songs were taken out, others were put in but the essence of the story was the same. I heard things were changed again in London and was curious to find out what they did.
The opening scene was one of the changes and it was awesome! It introduced Princess Fiona at the beginning of the show instead of her popping up halfway, very wise decision, it made the story complete.
I was a bit disappointed that Amanda Holden (judge on Britain’s Got Talent) was on holiday – I’d have loved to see her on stage. Her understudy – Alice Fearn – was good though, so I can’t complain 🙂
There are a lot of funny moments in the show and I was glad that Sabine laughed as well – her English isn’t that good yet so I was afraid that she’d miss the jokes. Compared to other musicals it seemed like the actors spoke slower than usual. Not sure if that’s true, but Sabine had no trouble understanding each word.
Nigel Lindsay ís Shrek, he’s loveable, huge (that must be one hot costume!), clumsy, funny – it was like the Shrek from the movies was put on stage, A+!! Richard Blackwood as Donkey is hilarious and Nigel Harman as Lord Farquaad is simply brilliant!! Poor guy spends the evening on stage on his knees, hats off!
In fact, there’s not one single bad thing that I can say about the actors or the show.
I loved the way the dragon was animated. It is moved by puppeteers, dressed in black, holding ‘sticks’ attached to it’s claws, tail, head and mouth and in such a way that you forget about the puppeteers and only see a moving and singing dragon – amazing! Kuddos to the lady – Landi Oshinowo – who is the voice of the dragon, you don’t see her during that song (she does play Humpty Dumpty as well) but she takes her bow, dressed in dragon colours, at the very end of the show, what a voice! Found a video at YouTube, do watch! In fact, there are so many awesome songs, search YouTube for ‘Shrek Musical’ (as opposed to Shrek Movie) and you will find more.
Of course we went to the Stagedoor. Had a lovely meeting with Nigel Harman but – stupid me! – due to the wrong camera settings the picture was blurred 🙁 Oh well, we have his autograph and the memory 🙂
Richard Blackwood was charming and took his time getting down the line, signing programs and posing for pics. Nigel Lindsay was kind and modest, he seemed a bit shy totally the opposite of the loud character on stage, loved meeting him! Alice Fearn walked by, we called her name and would’ve loved to tell her how much we enjoyed her performance, but she kept on walking without even blinking. Awww.
Amanda Holden’s last show will be October 3rd, and her role will be taken over by Girls Aloud star Kimberley Walsh.
