The Fellowship of Show and Stay
February 7th, 2008 by SamWednesday night and the chosen few left the Shire to embark upon a journey to Middle-Earth, well the Theatre Royal Drury Lane. I have to say I had high expectations of this production after all the media-hype and with the nickname Samwise Gamgee I already had a strange affiliation with the surprising creatures, soft as butter yet sometimes as tough as old tree roots (I would like to point out at this point that I am neither short, big footed or have hairy toes!). Overall I wasn’t disappointed, although there were elements of the “what?!” factor particularly with the Ents - who looked amazing but were using a crazy voice distorter which was more Lord of the Trekkies than Lord of the Rings.
The stage is PHENOMENAL! I really haven’t seen anything like it before, stretching from the proscenium right out to the edges of the Dress Circle, tangled tree roots create a canopy under which the audience watch the adventure unfold. The production is crammed with special effects, optical illusions and acrobatic stunts that leave you questioning your eyesight. The costumes, particularly with the Orcs, Gollum, Galadriel and Shelob (the giant spider) were sensational and in the case of the darker characters had me quaking in my seat (that spider should come with a health warning!). The infiltration of Orcs into the audience raised a few screams, which I have to be honest I missed most of as there was a rather interesting spot on the floor…I wasn’t scared, merely intrigued at the carpeting!
Samwise Gamgee, my namesake, stole the show for me; he was quite simply the best hobbit i’ve ever seen, where would Frodo be without him! The character of Saruman was played to perfection, he truly owned the stage and emanated pure darkness. His bellowing voice and domineering presence reached to the very corners of the auditorium. In pure contrast, Galadriel played by Laura Michelle Kelly was unadulterated light, she shone through the darkness and haunted the audience with a voice I would kill to have.
Not everything was perfection however, I was disappointed with the glaring chunks of story cut from the plot and the lack of time spent on building the relationships between characters. Obviously, these “cuts” were needed to keep the lengthy production to a minimum but the continual recapping smacked of a Steven Spielberg film - sometimes the audience can work it out for themselves, thanks all the same!
Overall the fellowship of Show and Stay were pleased with the results of their journey to Mordor and back and even though none of us have been promised eternal life, at least our friendships stood the test, Orcs and all!
Technorati Tags: ents, fellowship of the rings, frodo, galadriel, laura michelle kelly, lord of the rings, orcs, samwise gamgee, saruman, show and stay, theatre royal drury lane
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February 7th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
I am a huge Tolkien enthusiast and in my opinion Sam and Frodo are the heroes, and without Sam Frodo would never have survived to reach Mount Doom. It was Frodo who made the ultimate sacrifice though and he knew what it would cost him. I thought the musical was wonderfully staged, the special effects and costumes and set designs were outstanding. The music was quite weak but I knew it would be beforehand. We were disappointed in Gandalf, whose vocal delivery was not strong enough. I liked Sam better than Frodo who looked like Elijah Wood but didn’t have the presence.I thought Gollum was outstanding. Sad to miss all the Rohan element and many of the other characters but understand why.
February 8th, 2008 at 9:43 am
I completely agree with you, Frodo did look like Elijah Wood but wasn’t quite gutsy enough for me! I had heard that Gollum played by Michael Therriault was outstanding but unfortunately for the performance we saw, Gollum was played by an understudy and he had an air of “Frank Spencer” about him which I found quite off putting. His movement and costume however were every inch Tolkien’s vision! I completely understand why they had cut elements but I really missed some of the character development and relationships. I’d like to have seen the original Canadian performance that was over 3 hours long!