Sunday, February 10, 2008

Flying Cows and Mincing Queens.


What a lovely way to spend a few days! The lad and I dropped the kids with their Grandparents (thank God for grandparents) and took off to Melbourne for a flat out, no stopping, barely time to breathe, theatre extravaganza!

Melbourne is a wash with great musicals at the moment and seeing as we just couldn't decided between two of the biggies, we decided to do both. Hell, had I have known that Keating the Musical was in town I would have done three.

Friday we dropped the big kids at school, stopped for a quick coffee with Sam, dropped the third one with Grandma and Pa and took off to the city. After a quick trip to Bloch (well a girl needs new dance things every so often) and lunch at the Blue Train, it was back to the hotel room (via a pint at The Elephant and Wheelbarrow) to dress for Spamalot.

What great fun! If you love Monty Python you will love Spamalot. Even if you don't love Monty Python there is a fair chance that you will love Spamalot. The production team have done a great job of bringing some much loved film moments to the stage with clever tricks and intelligent use of technology. There are all the great parts of The Holy Grail including the rabbit jokes, the knights who say "Ni", the black knight and the flying cow. We laughed and cheered and even the rude guy behind us who insisted on narrating the show couldn't ruin the experience.

After another quick pint at The Elephant (well it was very close to the theatre) it was back to room for some sleep to prepare for act 2 of the great theatre experience.

Some breaky, a quick shop (this time for Jason) and then off to The Regent Theatre. This is easily my favourite theatre in Australia and probably in the world. If you have never been go and have a look. It is just superb! It reminds me of being in the most beautiful limestone cave and just fills me with joy. A step back to a time when beauty was something to aspire to.....

Saturday arvo saw us seeing Priscilla the Musical. I was a little worried about the tickets I had bought. I chose the upper dress circle because the remaining A reserve tickets were off to the side and I had a feeling that a straight view would be much better. When we arrived we were told to move forward 3 rows and sit in the dead centre if we liked! The seats we ended up in were great. Straight down the barrel. The only issue being we couldn't make out facial expression from that distance but it gave a great full view of the stage.

Priscilla was amazing. It was even better than the movie in my opinion, having more songs and the biggest, campest stage numbers. Drag queens just lend themselves to huge extravagant stage numbers. It was funny and moving and the performances were brilliant. Jeremy Stanford, Daniel Scott and Tony Sheldon do an amazing job of filling some very big shoes. The costuming and production was just awe inspiring, better than the movie in my opinion. If you see one show this year, make it Priscilla.

The only disappointing part of the weekend.... My light up daiquiri glass met a foul end at the hands of Jason's new home theatre system. Don't ask....

My apologies for over use of the exclamation point! It was just a great weekend!

4 comments:

Sam said...

don't apologise for the overuse of exclamation marks, I am surely the queen of !!!

Sounds fabulous! I'm looking forward to my turn at the theatre in March, now just to decide between the 2.. or maybe do both as well! lol

Tania said...

What an exciting weekend!!!

the little knitter who could said...

sounds fab! I'm going to see spamalot in April and I can't wait! I feel like watching search for the holy grail tonight now!

Rachael said...

Oh what an awesome weekend. How I would love one just like that...it's a long way in my future I suspect!

(and how great you have a willing partner...I don't think G and I have *ever* been to the theatre together!)