Ruth Leon recommends….So in Love – Kiss Me Kate
Ruth Leon recommendsSo in Love – Kiss Me Kate
There’s a new production of Cole Porter’s great musical at the Barbican Theatre until Sept 14th. The casting is a bit odd. Who would ever have thought of bluff, Irish Adrian Dunbar r as a matinee idol who sings some of the most romantic songs ever written for the musical stage?
Nothing odd about the choice of his leading lady, though, Tony Award-winning Broadway royalty Stephanie J. Block. Here she is, in a garden somewhere, with this glorious romantic ballad, ‘So In Love‘ from Kiss me, Kate.
Just because.
Dunbar is a good actor but cannot sing in tune!
He struggles with Porter’s ballads which at times sound painful..
Charlie Stemp is the star of the real star of the show..
The band sound tinny with a poor sound system in a theatre not built for musicals and the orchestrations sound thin and mean.
Still worth seeing, tho’ the piece is very dated dated now and only saved by slick energetic choreography
That’s the Conservatory in the Barbican.
My wife and I, Americans about to visit the UK again, have tickets to this show and are very much looking forward to it, except for certain, uh, conveniences–or, as the case may be, INconveniences, recalled from previous mentions on this website.
https://slippedisc.com/2024/03/when-at-the-barbican-dont-go/
https://slippedisc.com/2024/04/what-to-avoid-at-the-barbican/
Don’t worry Slipped those comments are twenty years old everything is fine now.
They’ve installed quite posh temporary toilets in the lobby: “Queue here for urinals” and “Queue here for cubicles”. Just fine when I last went there at the end of July.