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Review: The Peaceful Hour 2 at Liverpool's Royal Court ***1/2
Back in the day, many a Merseysider would make a late-night date with Radio City’s The Peaceful Hour – tuning in to drop off to its soothing musical vibes and the dulcet tones of one Pete Price Esq. It means before anyone even reaches for the radio dial on stage, there’s an immediate layer of nostalgia which underpins The Peaceful Hour 2, playwright Gerry Linford’s amiable, knockabout late night-set sequel to the titular comedy which was premiered at the Royal Court 12 months
Review: Tabakova Accordion Concerto at the Liverpool Philharmonic ****1/2
While this Thursday night concert on a chill January evening was officially billed as 'Rachmaninov Symphony No.3', it was really all about the accordion with the UK premiere of a new concerto from the ebullient Bulgarian-British composer Dobrinka Tabakova. And who better to perform it than Ksenija Sidorova, whose artistry with what is essentially a portable organ (albeit a backbreakingly heavy one at 20kg/three-and-a-half stone in old money) is unparalleled. If you’ve ever tr
Review: Mary Poppins at the Liverpool Empire *****
Author PL Travers actively disliked Disney’s Oscar-winning screen version of Mary Poppins with its dancing penguins, (in her view) overly sugary heroine and twee sentimentality and, perhaps more incomprehensibly, the Sherman Brothers’ soundtrack of songs. Apparently, she took a lot of persuading before agreeing to let Cameron Mackintosh create a stage version and only then with a whole raft of provisos – although she didn’t live to see the subsequent show premiere in the West
Review: Inspector Morse at the Liverpool Playhouse ***1/2
Inspector Morse was a TV staple in the 1980s and 90s, regularly pulling in audiences of up to 18 million and spawning not one but two successful spin off series – the latter, Endeavour, starring Liverpool’s own Shaun Evans. Morse's star John Thaw was just 45 when the first series was screened, albeit he wore middle age in worn-in fashion, which suited Colin Dexter's curmudgeonly character. Tom Chambers, who takes on detective duties in this first stage outing, is currently 48
Review: Stocking Fillers at the Royal Court Studio ***1/2
Upstairs, a swearier than usual Mr Scrooge is being taught the error of his ways by three mysterious ‘ghosts’. Downstairs in the Royal Court Studio on the other hand, there are veteran fir tree fairies, megalomaniac elves, secret Santas, disastrous office parties and, above all, a reminder that this is the season of goodwill to all. The annual Royal Court Stocking Fillers is a chance for some who attend the theatre’s writing groups during the year to showcase their work in su
Review: Sleeping Beauty at the Floral Pavilion ***1/2
Deck the halls with boughs of holly – and a thicket of thorns so fiendish it will take a handsome prince to hack through. ‘Tis the season to be jolly. And there’s plenty to be jolly about in the Floral Pavilion’s seasonal offering Sleeping Beauty, which delivers the classic story with a good sprinkling of the songs of the year including Chappell Roan’s Pink Pony Club and – seemingly unavoidable if you go to any panto anywhere this Christmas – K-Pop earworm Golden. There's als
Review: Cinderella at the Epstein Theatre ****
It is, according to Andy Williams, the most wonderful time of the year. And Cinderella is the most famous fairytale of them all. So put the two together and you already have a winning combination. Inject plenty of high energy and hi-jinks into the proceedings and resistance is futile, even for the biggest Christmas curmudgeon or the grinchiest Grinch. That’s certainly the maxim of Regal Entertainments, purveyors of festive tomfoolery for over quarter of a century and the team
Review: Young Frankenstein at the Liverpool Playhouse ****
It’s five years now since the Liverpool Playhouse last staged an overt ‘Christmas’ production – Dickens’ A Christmas Carol for a socially distanced season mid-pandemic. Since then, while they’ve continued to rock ‘n’ roll up the road in Hope Street, the Playhouse has experimented with its festive offerings, from Fantastically Great Women and fantastically feisty female monarchs (SIX the Musical) to the spookily supernatural (The Woman in Black) and the outrageously camp in th
Review: Matilda the Musical at the Liverpool Empire *****
It recently entered its 15 th year on the London stage, putting it in the top 10 of longest-running West End shows. But when the RSC commissioned the stage musical version of Roald Dahl’s children's book Matilda back in December 2008, it was a leap of faith for a company best known for presenting the works of Shakespeare to generations of theatregoers. Not only that, but they enlisted musicals first timer Dennis Kelly to adapt the book, and kohl-eyed, wild-haired Aussie come
Review: Stella at the Unity Theatre ****
Robert Farquhar’s sharply scripted, comi-tragic one-woman play Stella charmed audiences when it was given an initial outing at the Unity Theatre’s Up Next Festival earlier this year. It sold out then and it’s practically sold out again on its pre-Christmas return to the Hope Place stage with the kinetic Kalli Tant reprising her role as the lead (in fact all the play’s) character(s). Pleasingly for a story about a young woman on a tumultuous journey of self-discovery, the audi
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