Whistle Down The Wind to return to the Westend

Heli · 18 Feb 2006, 22:40

Rumour has it that Whistle Down the Wind will take over after the departure of The Woman in White in June. It's said that the show will run only until October, when an official run of the broadway musical "SpamAlot" will start!

Not been confirmed yet but by the sounds of it, it's more than likely.

Chris · 18 Feb 2006, 22:50

I didn;t think SpamALot had been adapted for the West End yet.
The Broadway version won't be appearing as it has tto many Broadway references in that European audiences won't get.
Last i heard, Eric Idle was struggling to adapt it. He might have succeeded by now tho.

Heli · 18 Feb 2006, 22:54

http://www.dewynters.com/spamalot/

Chris · 18 Feb 2006, 22:56

I stand corrected.

As a PythonPurist I am not sure whether to attend it or not.

Heli · 18 Feb 2006, 23:07

I am!!!

Eddie Izzard is apparently in it!

There can't be any harm in going...!

needmoremeat · 19 Feb 2006, 19:49

Oh, I hope David Hyde Pierce (Niles in Frasier) is in Spamalot in London! He was in it in Chicago, and as there has already been two out of three actors from high profile American sitcoms came to the West End after the shows ended we should have someone from Frasier over! But not just anyone from Frasier: Niles from Frasier!!!!!!!!

Me and Mam would love to see him in that, and on this side of the Atlantic

Seen Whistle Down the Wind twice at the Empire, and much as I love it I don't think I could afford to go to London to see it!

Rob The Badger · 21 Feb 2006, 02:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Heli

I am!!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Heli

Eddie Izzard is apparently in it!

There can't be any harm in going...!

Well if that's true it's moved me from 'undecided' to 'I'm there.'

scotty · 21 Feb 2006, 17:03

They have just reported on Capital FM that Spamalot will be in the palace theatre in October, Bookings are being taken now.

needmoremeat · 29 Mar 2006, 10:17

Was a review of WDTW in the Mail yesterday, and not a single mention of Jim

Although the review wasn't completely wonderful, so maybe he was done a favour by keeping his name out.

I have a letter from the Empire Theatre from when WDTW last came to the venue especially for the show, giving a flattering review and ticket prices...and there wasn't a single mention of ALW!!!!!

It was Jim Steinman all the way through!

Pudding · 29 Mar 2006, 10:44

I posted a link on Rockman and The Naked Wire and thought someone might have posted one on here by now

Anyway, if you go to http://www.whatsonstage.com/dl/page....E8821143529994 you can view pictures and a small opening night video that shows non other than Jacqueline Dillon, the lady who runs Jimsteinman.com

Enjoy

Pud

**Diane** · 31 Mar 2006, 20:03

Andrew's Whistling Dixie ...
by Baz Bamigboye
Daily Mail, Friday 31st March

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER swopped Lancashire for the Deep South in his ( hey, hang on, what about Jim?!!! - Diane) musical version of Whistle Down The Wind ... and now it's headed in that direction.

Bill Kenwright, who directed the latest production at the Palace Theatre, is planning to tour the musical around America's Bible belt and elsewhere in the U.S. after its 17-week run at the Palace ends. "It's a different world there, Middle America," Bill commented.

"No matter what," he said (echoing one of the shows popular songs), I'm going to make it an American hit." And he also wants it to land on Broadway.

Actually, I thought this production better than the original that ran a few years ago at the Aldwych, in that the director concentrates on the story and score.

At the Aldwych, the set just swamped everything. What's more, Tim Rogers, who plays The Man, has a powerful voice that, in Act 2 particularly, soars along with the score - which I should add is good to hear live.

Watching the show also gives us some clues as to why America's in such a state at the moment, with a lot of the strings being pulled by religious Right-wing reactionaries.

So WDTW could be off to America at last!

Just a note: Baz Bamigboye has been a staunch supporter of WDTW, right from the time it first workshopped in Washington DC.

Diane

**Diane** · 31 Mar 2006, 20:25

... and a not so good review from the Financial Times http://news.ft.com/cms/s/88c52318-be...779e2340.html:

Whistle Down the Wind, Palace Theatre, London
By Ian Shuttleworth
Published: March 28 2006 18:04 | Last updated: March 28 2006 18:04

With the closure of The Woman in White after only 17 months, the producer Bill Kenwright has drafted in this earlier work to fill the theatre until Eric Idle’s Spamalot begins previewing. As a serendipitous result, one Andrew Lloyd Webber musical in which a train hurtles out of a tunnel at a climactic moment has been replaced by another (and neither is Starlight Express).

On its West End premiere in 1998, Alastair Macaulay described the musical adaptation of Mary Hayley Bell’s novel and Bryan Forbes’s 1961 film as “entirely harmless and almost entirely uninteresting”. That is not an unfair verdict. On this, my first exposure to the show, I was intrigued to hear Lloyd Webber rising to the challenge implicitly posed by his lyricist Jim Steinman, creator of Meat Loaf’s Bat out of Hell and other rock arias.

Transposing Bell’s story from England to 1959 Louisiana allows the writers to hitch a ride on the first flush of rock’n’roll and the archetypal teen rebellion associated with it. The Lloyd Webber/Steinman partnership comes good on numbers such as “A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste”, all burning rubber and hormones, sounding somewhere between Springsteen and Wagner, albeit with added monosodium glutamate. But most of the time the score sets the emotional pace, and never breaks sweat. And the story – of a teenage girl in the Bible Belt (Claire Marlowe, too old to play such innocence convincingly) finding a murderer hiding in her barn (Tim Rogers, all musical theatre tragic hero) and mistaking him for Jesus Christ – really needs some emotional intensity in the telling, not mere button-pushing.

Kenwright’s direction does not help, and Henry Metcalfe’s choreography is similarly journeyman. Kenwright famously cannot bear to see a theatre left “dark”, which I presume explains this betwixt-and- between piece of scheduling: I can see no other rationale behind the decision to take a show deliberately premiered in the medium- sized Aldwych Theatre and revive it in a venue awash with gilt plasterwork and wholly at odds with Paul Farnsworth’s timber-and- big-sky design. Still, the show is entirely harmless. ★★★☆☆

18 Feb 2006, 22:40	#1
Heli Daddy's little internet junkie Join Date: 29.01.2004 Location: Grimsby Posts: 4,596	Whistle Down The Wind to return to the Westend Rumour has it that Whistle Down the Wind will take over after the departure of The Woman in White in June. It's said that the show will run only until October, when an official run of the broadway musical "SpamAlot" will start! Not been confirmed yet but by the sounds of it, it's more than likely.

18 Feb 2006, 22:50	#2
Chris Mega Loafer Join Date: 14.04.2002 Location: Somewhere in the real world. Posts: 7,527	I didn;t think SpamALot had been adapted for the West End yet. The Broadway version won't be appearing as it has tto many Broadway references in that European audiences won't get. Last i heard, Eric Idle was struggling to adapt it. He might have succeeded by now tho.

18 Feb 2006, 22:54	#3
Heli Daddy's little internet junkie Join Date: 29.01.2004 Location: Grimsby Posts: 4,596	http://www.dewynters.com/spamalot/

18 Feb 2006, 22:56	#4
Chris Mega Loafer Join Date: 14.04.2002 Location: Somewhere in the real world. Posts: 7,527	I stand corrected. As a PythonPurist I am not sure whether to attend it or not.

18 Feb 2006, 23:07	#5
Heli Daddy's little internet junkie Join Date: 29.01.2004 Location: Grimsby Posts: 4,596	I am!!! Eddie Izzard is apparently in it! There can't be any harm in going...!

19 Feb 2006, 19:49	#6
needmoremeat Mega Loafer Join Date: 23.11.2003 Location: Sunderland, UK Posts: 1,416	Oh, I hope David Hyde Pierce (Niles in Frasier) is in Spamalot in London! He was in it in Chicago, and as there has already been two out of three actors from high profile American sitcoms came to the West End after the shows ended we should have someone from Frasier over! But not just anyone from Frasier: Niles from Frasier!!!!!!!! Me and Mam would love to see him in that, and on this side of the Atlantic Seen Whistle Down the Wind twice at the Empire, and much as I love it I don't think I could afford to go to London to see it!

21 Feb 2006, 17:03	#8
scotty Mega Loafer Join Date: 25.11.2003 Location: Harlow Essex Posts: 1,166	They have just reported on Capital FM that Spamalot will be in the palace theatre in October, Bookings are being taken now.

29 Mar 2006, 10:17	#9
needmoremeat Mega Loafer Join Date: 23.11.2003 Location: Sunderland, UK Posts: 1,416	Was a review of WDTW in the Mail yesterday, and not a single mention of Jim Although the review wasn't completely wonderful, so maybe he was done a favour by keeping his name out. I have a letter from the Empire Theatre from when WDTW last came to the venue especially for the show, giving a flattering review and ticket prices...and there wasn't a single mention of ALW!!!!! It was Jim Steinman all the way through!

29 Mar 2006, 10:44	#10
Pudding I'm A Prize Fight Lover... Join Date: 22.10.2003 Location: New Zealand Posts: 5,532	I posted a link on Rockman and The Naked Wire and thought someone might have posted one on here by now Anyway, if you go to http://www.whatsonstage.com/dl/page....E8821143529994 you can view pictures and a small opening night video that shows non other than Jacqueline Dillon, the lady who runs Jimsteinman.com Enjoy Pud

31 Mar 2006, 20:03	#11
Diane Super Moderator Join Date: 04.02.2003 Location: Guernsey, Channel Islands Posts: 3,462	Andrew's Whistling Dixie ... by Baz Bamigboye Daily Mail, Friday 31st March ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER swopped Lancashire for the Deep South in his ( hey, hang on, what about Jim?!!! - Diane) musical version of Whistle Down The Wind ... and now it's headed in that direction. Bill Kenwright, who directed the latest production at the Palace Theatre, is planning to tour the musical around America's Bible belt and elsewhere in the U.S. after its 17-week run at the Palace ends. "It's a different world there, Middle America," Bill commented. "No matter what," he said (echoing one of the shows popular songs), I'm going to make it an American hit." And he also wants it to land on Broadway. Actually, I thought this production better than the original that ran a few years ago at the Aldwych, in that the director concentrates on the story and score. At the Aldwych, the set just swamped everything. What's more, Tim Rogers, who plays The Man, has a powerful voice that, in Act 2 particularly, soars along with the score - which I should add is good to hear live. Watching the show also gives us some clues as to why America's in such a state at the moment, with a lot of the strings being pulled by religious Right-wing reactionaries. So WDTW could be off to America at last! Just a note: Baz Bamigboye has been a staunch supporter of WDTW, right from the time it first workshopped in Washington DC. Diane

31 Mar 2006, 20:25	#12
Diane Super Moderator Join Date: 04.02.2003 Location: Guernsey, Channel Islands Posts: 3,462	... and a not so good review from the Financial Times http://news.ft.com/cms/s/88c52318-be...779e2340.html: Whistle Down the Wind, Palace Theatre, London By Ian Shuttleworth Published: March 28 2006 18:04 \| Last updated: March 28 2006 18:04 With the closure of The Woman in White after only 17 months, the producer Bill Kenwright has drafted in this earlier work to fill the theatre until Eric Idle’s Spamalot begins previewing. As a serendipitous result, one Andrew Lloyd Webber musical in which a train hurtles out of a tunnel at a climactic moment has been replaced by another (and neither is Starlight Express). On its West End premiere in 1998, Alastair Macaulay described the musical adaptation of Mary Hayley Bell’s novel and Bryan Forbes’s 1961 film as “entirely harmless and almost entirely uninteresting”. That is not an unfair verdict. On this, my first exposure to the show, I was intrigued to hear Lloyd Webber rising to the challenge implicitly posed by his lyricist Jim Steinman, creator of Meat Loaf’s Bat out of Hell and other rock arias. Transposing Bell’s story from England to 1959 Louisiana allows the writers to hitch a ride on the first flush of rock’n’roll and the archetypal teen rebellion associated with it. The Lloyd Webber/Steinman partnership comes good on numbers such as “A Kiss is a Terrible Thing to Waste”, all burning rubber and hormones, sounding somewhere between Springsteen and Wagner, albeit with added monosodium glutamate. But most of the time the score sets the emotional pace, and never breaks sweat. And the story – of a teenage girl in the Bible Belt (Claire Marlowe, too old to play such innocence convincingly) finding a murderer hiding in her barn (Tim Rogers, all musical theatre tragic hero) and mistaking him for Jesus Christ – really needs some emotional intensity in the telling, not mere button-pushing. Kenwright’s direction does not help, and Henry Metcalfe’s choreography is similarly journeyman. Kenwright famously cannot bear to see a theatre left “dark”, which I presume explains this betwixt-and- between piece of scheduling: I can see no other rationale behind the decision to take a show deliberately premiered in the medium- sized Aldwych Theatre and revive it in a venue awash with gilt plasterwork and wholly at odds with Paul Farnsworth’s timber-and- big-sky design. Still, the show is entirely harmless. ★★★☆☆