All Bob’s Women closes after just 9 performances

I’ve just returned from a short vacation to discover that All Bob’s Women has opened, and is promptly about to shut. To say it wasn’t a huge success would be an understatement.

‘They’re playing our song’ comes to the Menier

It has been reported this morning (What’s on Stage appear to have got there first) that this summer’s musical at the Menier Chocolate Factory is going to be a revival of Marvin Hamlisch’s They’re Playing Our Song.

Coming to a West End theatre near you?

Back in March, when this blog was still just days old, I wrote a post entitled ‘Upcoming shows – why musical theatre fans should be excited’ in which I talked about 4 shows rumoured to be coming to London that I was looking forward to. One of the shows, Spring Awakening, has since announced that it will be opening at the Lyric Hammersmith.

Over recent weeks, the number of new shows either being rumoured, or announced, seems to have accelerated. I thought it was worth providing a round-up of rumours, to give you a sense of what you can expect to see arriving in London over the next 6-12 months.

Where theatre and sport collide: Michael Billington on Darts

For those of you that haven’t already seen this morning’s edition of The Guardian, I’d highly encourage you to pay a trip the newspaper’s website. Over the next couple of days, there is a fabulous feature in the paper’s G2 section, where the arts critics and sports writers swap roles for the day.

2008 Tony Awards – the musical winners

Last night saw the Tony Awards ceremony, and I was hoping to see some success for the Broadway production of Sunday In the Park with George, originally produced at the Menier Chocolate Factory. Unfortunately, it didn’t pick up any of the 9 awards that it was nominated for – instead, it was left to South Pacific, In The Heights and Gypsy to share the spoils..

The Friday musical round-up: 13th June

Hi everyone – I hope you have had a good week. The musical news this week is mostly about new shows – we’ve had 2 opening nights and 3 new shows. To round things out, we also have a West End debut as an interesting response to a show’s closing…

Review round-up: Afterlife (National Theatre)

I went to the National Theatre on Tuesday night to see Michael Frayn’s new play, Afterlife, at what was press night.

I generally prefer not to stray too far out of my writing comfort zone and instead, I concentrated on writing about musical theatre in this blog (as you’ll see if you look at my planned trips for this year, you’ll notice a very clear bias towards musicals.

Given that, I don’t plan to write a full review of Afterlife – there have been plenty of other people offering their thoughts on the play, so instead, I’ve decided to pick up what they have said, and whether I agree at all with them.

In response to Jonathan Miller…

He’s not the first person to say it, but in an interview with The Times this week, Jonathan Miller has lashed out at the “obsession with celebrity” that has become part and parcel of the London theatre scene.

Unsurprisingly, his views have garnered a fair amount of coverage, just as Kevin Spacey’s criticisms of the BBC did earlier this year. The press can’t help getting excited about big names in the theatre getting angry – just look at some of the headlines this week - “West End is ‘celebrity obsessed’” and “Director slams West End ‘obsession’” to pick two.

The BBC should read this if they’re planning another series like ‘I’d do Anything’

Dear BBC,

I have been watching your recent series of ‘I’d Do Anything’ with great interest, and was particularly delighted to see such a worth winner as Jodie Prenger emerge in this week’s final. It seems that there has already been much speculation as to whether you will be producing another series of the ‘find-a-star’ format next year, given the level of criticism that the show received earlier this series.

The Friday musical round-up: 6th June

Happy Friday everyone! In this week’s musical theatre round-up, there’s a couple of closing notices, casting news for 3 shows an announcements of 2 new musicals. Read on for more …