Friday, April 04, 2008

Billy Elliot liiiiike!

There is something distinctly odd about watching a Musical performed entirely in Geordie accents but that is what we experienced last Friday when we went to see Billy Elliot at the Capital Theatre.

I am a big fan of the movie so the musical was the next logical step, it's been playing in Sydney since last November and it finishes up next week so it was lucky we managed to get tickets.

Overall, I thought the show was excellent. The young actor who played 'Billy' was outstanding and was supported by an equally good cast. The show kept true to the original story line and embellished certain areas in true
musical style (the Priscilla-inspired dancing dresses and the Maggie Thatcher fairground were additions that I don't recall from the movie!) that added to the humour as well as the seriousness.

The show started with some Pathe news reels of history and set the scene for the the miners strike of Maggie T's Tory era and the class war that followed. We watched as Billy 'F' and blinded his way through boxing, ballet, watching after his Nan and his families struggle with a year long strike and their working class son's love of dance not dirt.

As someone who spent many a year in Newcastle (ok, the story is set in Durham and true Geordie's can tell the difference between a Newcastle, Gateshead, Sunderland, Durham, Middleborough and Northumberland accent) I felt more qualified than most to judge (and understand!) the accents being spoken and sung. Most did pretty well I thought and there was definitely enough swearing to make it authentic!

I believe if there was a 'crowd favourite' award though, it would've easily gone to the young lad who played the camp cross-dressing Michael - his parts where hilarious and had the crowd in stitches!

1 comment:

Steven said...

Sounds like a good show - all in Geordie like... Bet the Oz folk were a bit baffled!

Why don't you put a few of your hen party sketches up... Or are they a bit too "Anatomical" for this blog!!??

36mins for 6Kms huh? Pretty good, I'm going jogging with Varuni now as part of her weight loss program - I have a slight advantage with my loooooong legs!

As predicted, Mum loved the pics of Zhanna :)