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HMS Pinafore at the Savoy Theatre (December 2002)
"As Buttercup, Della
Jones uses every part of her characterful voice, acting as a
pantomimic fairy godmother with Welsh accent and rampant libido. As
Sir Joseph Porter, Sam Kelly exhibits commendable clarity of
diction, sung or spoken. Tom McVeigh, as Captain Corcoran, gamely
affects the vulnerability of a public school twit (and) Josephine,
played last night by Alison Rae Jones, offered a sense of fragility
and fragrance. Feathers protruding from her hat, a bespectacled and
adorable Sophie-Louise Dann plays the part of Hebe as an antiquated
but lively, handbag wielding busybody.
There was fine work from the supporting chorus of sailors,
aunts and cousins, and the playing from the small orchestra ...was
commendable in its crisp exactitude."
Stephen Pettitt - Evening
Standard
"This is neo-D'Oyly Carte, thank goodness,
bright and streamlined, with the cobwebs blown away, but still true
to the essential traditions. Both words and music sparkle as they
should.
Sam Kelly's
portrayal of Sir Joseph Porter, Ruler of the Queen's Navee, is
masterly.
Della Jones is a well-built Buttercup
with an engaging Welsh lilt, and Sophie-Louise Dann works wonders
with the relatively small part of Hebe, Sir Joseph's interfering
cousin."
Sunday
Telegraph
"Gilbert's
satire on class distinctions and official pomposity is as timely and
as witty as ever, while Sullivan's melodies remain maddeningly
infectious. Martin Duncan's production gets the right balance
between text and music with razor sharp diction from a largely opera
trained cast.
Tom McVeigh, his posture stiff with
upper-crust hauteur, is a cool and supercilious Captain Corcoran,
Gareth Jones, a delightful curmudgeonly Dick Deadeye and Sophie
Louise Dann amusingly irritating as myopic, interfering spinster
Hebe.
The fun extends to Tim Hatley's
bold, streamlined art deco sets, which resemble a huge blow-up of a
poster for Cunard's White Star line. Setting off Hatley's designs to
perfection are the terrifically camp male chorus of sailors,
twinkling in skimpy singlets and fetching black boots, and the
simpering female chorus of 'sisters, cousins and aunts'."
Jason Best - The
Stage
"Martin Duncan's
production, with a delightful airy design of the Pinafore's
quarterdeck by Tim Hatley, has exactly the freshness, charm and
cheek the show demands. What a pleasure it is, too, to hear the
company singing so beautifully and so audibly without the
overamplification that blights so many musicals today. The pit band,
under the baton of John Owen Edwards, is also
first-rate.
Della Jones is a delight as
Buttercup, while Alison Rae Jones and Joseph Shovelton gleefully
send up the conventions of romantic melodrama as the young
lovers.
It's an exceptionally winning show, so give three cheers
and one cheer more for this splendid staging of the
Pinafore."
Charles Spencer - The Telegraph
"Martin Duncan's
witty, bulgingly tongue-in-cheek production brings G&S fizzingly
up to date without cheapening or vulgarizing the great Savoy Operas
tradition.
The slickly choreographed chorus of
toe-tapping tars and tottering cousins, sisters and aunts would
grace any st1:place>West End
show.
Treat yourself."
David
Gillard - The Daily
Mail
"This production) lights up the December sky with
gaiety and good tunes.
Joseph Shovelton fills
the young hero's shoes so crisply and mellifluously that you forget
the difficulties of his task.
You're guaranteed a good
time."
Geoff Brown - The
Times
Mikado at the Savoy
Theatre (July 2002)
" Ian Judge's
production certainly gets it right, the laughs (and there are lots)
coming mainly from the silliness of the English japing at being
Japanese. "
David Gillard - The Daily
Mail
" In one sense the joke of
The Mikado has today been turned on its head: instead of an English
passion for all things Japanese, there is now a Japanese fashion for
all things English, and sure enough this production contains its
fair share of World Cup jokes. But the piece survives as much
through Sullivan's irresistible melodies as Gilbert's book and,
thanks to John Owen Edwards' lively musical direction, Self's
Katisha and a notably well-sung Yum-Yum from Jacqueline Varsey, this
production sends you away a much happier being.
"
Michael Billington - The
Guardian
" Top marks go to the strong young voices
of the D'Oyly Carte chorus as well as to the choreography of Lyn
Jolly, who creates impressive human stage-pictures on the minimal,
versatile sets of Tm Goodchild. Gareth Jones's baritone and Royce
Mill's comic timing excel, and gifted tenor Joseph Shovelton is damn
near perfect as Nanki-Poo. "
Lisa
Garham - Metro (
London
)
" The show is full of inventive wit - just look at the chorus
of very English Japanese gentlemen tucking into their sushi - and as
one inured to the over-amplification of West End musical, it is a
rare pleasure to experience this wonderfully melodic operetta
without the singers, or the excellent pit band, being amped
up."
Charles Spencer - The Daily
Telegraph
" Watching John La Bouchardière's revival
of Ian Judge's show, it's hard to remember that 20 years ago the old
D'Oyly Carte troupe was dying on its feet. Not any more. Even the
chorus is virile-voiced and moves niftily in the smallest
spaces. "
Geoff Brown -
The Times
" Publicity has focused on comedian Jasper Carrott as Ko-Ko,
the new Lord High Executioner. Initially subdued, he gets his first
belly laugh adding a certain
England
goalkeeper to his list and tunefully comes into his own with the
Titwillow solo, before sharing the triumph of a duet with Susannah
Self's gorgeous Katasha."
John Thaxter - The
Stage
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