Musical Performance: The Show Must Go On

Well, my mother finally got sick of the same old stories on the current affairs programmes tonight. Now, on Sunday - Thumbs Up Theatre Toronto watched a live stream from the Palace Theatre London! It was the swansong for The Shows Must Go On - a medley of songs from the famous musicals. Sadly, of course, I was stuck watching tv with my mother, as usual. But YESSSS - IT'S STILL AVAILABLE! For a week afterwards, it seems - so, until Sunday night, I guess. So I whacked it on my phone..

Oh man, it's awesome. I don't know how many times I broke down, just to see live musical theatre back. And the nostalgia of all the shows I'd seen - & Juliet, Hamilton, Mamma Mia!, The Book of Mormon, Come From Away, Everybody's Talking About Jamie, Les Misérables, The Phantom of the Opera. The shows I'd booked, which got cancelled - Dear Evan Hansen and Tina. And all the others: SIX, The Lion King, Mary Poppins, Pretty Woman, Back to the Future (jeez, I didn't even know there was a musical of that!), Matilda, Wicked, and The Prince of Egypt!

Songs were introduced in pairs - one from each musical - and belted out with gusto. Even my mother listened to most of it - and decided that the singer of Bring Him Home from Les Misérables wasn't as good as Colm Wilkinson. She came with me to Dublin to see that - Phantom, we saw in London when I was a kid. I can't fault John Owen Jones' powerful performance, though. But the standout performance for me was Aisha Jawando - practically channelling Tina Turner in an explosive performance of We Don't Need Another Hero, from Tina. Oh, I MUST book for that again.

Peppered throughout the show are ads for Theatre Support Fund, where you can donate, or buy merchandise. I have my eye on the t-shirt, personally.. might wait until I'm back, though, and it's cheaper: and the whole spectacle finishes with a speech by Sadiq Khan (interesting to watch the chat at this point, where people wondered what he was going to sing), and a thrilling version of The Show Must Go On, performed by the whole company! Ah, if you love musical theatre, you just have to watch this..

They're advertising Crazy Rich Asians as the Saturday night movie. Awesome, another I hadn't seen.. being stuck in Ireland for the pandemic is at least helping me get through my film list..