We love a wacky musical and they don’t come much wackier than Opening Night, a brand new West End show from the pen of singer-songwriter Rufus Wainwright. Based on a 1977 film of the same name, the musical stars Sheridan Smith as an ageing has-been who’s lost her mojo and hit the bottle. It’s a familiar, well-trodden Judy and Norma theme. Despite a dedicated fanbase, Rufus Wainwright has been little troubled by commercial success. And I can see why. The score is dissonant, dense and tuneless – a torch song tale without the torch songs.
The production itself is a pretentious mess – shouty, angry and hard to follow, with bizarre staging involving TVs dotted about the auditorium and a large screen above the stage which, from where we were sitting, was largely obscured. We weren’t sure when and where to look – stage or screen – so by the second half we didn’t bother to look at all. The cast made the best of a bad lot and, come curtain call, the audience applauded politely, mostly out of pity, I thought.
Afterwards, as we piled onto the street in need of a stiff drink, Liam said, ‘Well, that was a pile of old shit’. The woman in front of us turned round and said, ‘I’m so glad you said that. It really was shit.’
We drowned our sorrows in Soho.
Oh dear! Sounds fairly disastrous!
LikeLike
It was. I don’t usually comment on shows I haven’t liked but this was a total mess.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Hate it when that happens.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You win some, you lose some 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sounds pretty awful. Thankfully you get a lot of good ones also.
LikeLike
We do, thankfully 😉
LikeLike