Review – The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Donmar Warehouse

Dear Mister Grandage

Please find enclosed a “Sorry You’re Leaving Card”.

We know that before you go there’s at least another Pinter, a Schiller and a Shakespeare to get through but in case we should somehow not get round to these we just wanted to say ‘sorry’ for missing the point of some of your European dramas and non-comedic musicals over the years.

We know you meant well by them and fully accept that the inadequacy is ours. We were, after all, the only people in the West End or on Broadway to be underwhelmed by Red.

Does that sound a bit negative? It’s not meant to. We really, really enjoyed many of the things you put on (Streetcar for instance) and are eternally in your debt for introducing us to the world of Enid Bagnold.

And now you have thrown us a delicious parting crumb in the form of a frothy American musical comedy, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Music & Lyrics by William Finn. Book by Rachel Sheinkin), which we saw in New York and thought would work well here. And it does.

Review – Sister Act with Whoopi Goldberg, London Palladium

We were less than whelmed the first time we saw Sister Act and an uncharacteristically charitable return visit to check whether we might not have been too hasty in casting the first stones proved equally unrewarding. You might think that that should be an end to it. And so did we. But there’s no prizes for guessing what dragged the Whingers back to the London Palladium.

Re-review: Sister Act with Patina Miller, London Palladium

Presumably due to some administrative error the Whingers ended up with free tickets to see Sister Act again at the London Palladium which they took up in order to see if seeing the star Patina Miller would make a difference to their somewhat muted reception.

Review – Sister Act The Musical, London Palladium

How the Whingers long for Ethel Merman.

They long for her perpetually but on Monday they were specifically longing for her “the show must go on” spirit: La Merman apparently never missed performances and was famously understudied by Elaine Stritch even though she was already appearing in another show, so confident were they that Merman would never be “off”

Now anyone can get an ailment. And even the Whingers have succumbed to the occasional sniffle (usually when watching Imitation of Life). And Andrew is, of course, a slave to his feet.