At the recent Lord of the Rings launch, director, Mathhew Warchus described the new show as “Shakespeare meets Cirque du Soleil.” It sounds like the actors in this stage show are going to be acrobats as well! A few casually dressed orcs demonstrated their skills at the launch by showing off their stunts on spring loaded stilts. Laura Michelle Kelly who plays elven Queen, Galadriel, has said that she is particularly excited about the groundbreaking elements of the show and the new skills required of the actors. Kelly has enthused about the show claiming that they are doing things she has never before seen done on stage - I guess we’ll have to wait until May to find out exactly what she means!

Warchus has promised theatre-goers that when the show opens in May, it will have the most highly skilled and hard working ensemble in the entire West End. A bold claim indeed, but then again, this is a man who has successfully directed a stage show based on some of the most famous and successful books of the last 100 years in the wake of the runaway success of the film trilogy. Not an easy task, especially when you consider the expectations of the millions of Lord of the Rings fans around the world.

So how has Matthew Warchus managed to turn this famous trilogy into a stage show lasting three hours? Warchus claims that he has taken the essence of the novels and reduced the plot back to the basic essentials to give viewers a different experience to the film. He claims that the Lord of the Rings show will be a more emotional experience for audience members. The audience will be completely immersed in all the action. They will be able to feel the wind through the trees, smell the smoke and be surrounded by the atmosphere. There is no doubt in my mind that theatre experiences are more intense than film experiences. With a story this powerful the Lord of the Rings has the potential to conjur up a range of human emotions among audience members.

The creative team of the Lord of the Rings claim that they have assessed and reassessed every aspect of the show in the nine months since the Toronto run came to an end. The team are said to be very proud of their efforts and have learnt a lot from their experiences in Canada to make the London show even better!

Let’s see how the show fares with the critics and the theatre fans when it opens in May.

Technorati Tags: critics, laura michelle kelly, lord of the rings, lord of the rings show, matthew warchus, orcs, show, theatre, theatre fans, west end

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This entry was posted on Thursday, February 22nd, 2007 at 12:06 pm and is filed under Theatre, Lord of the Rings. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.