I have been yelling that ever since I saw Billy Elliot the musical...which was only 4 hours ago, haha. BUT STILL. i don't know if I'll ever be able to stop. Because why? Because, my dear friends, Billy Elliot is the absolute BEST musical I have ever seen...but before you run off and go pay a zillion dollars to see what you think is going to be the greatest musical of all time, perhaps I should tell you this: I am a sucker for kids with talent. In fact, I am *such* a sucker for lil' kids with talent, that when I'm bored, THAT is exactly what I type in the Youtube search engine: "little kids with talent". Does this make me creepy? no. because I am a girl, so there. (boys who do that *are* creepy, and so if you are one of them, you should stop now because that makes you a pedophile and therefore a dangerous freak)
ANYWAY. back to Billy. (GOOO BILLLYYYY!) see, told ya. anyway, so yeah, I love kids with talent, and in this show, there are many of them. but all of the ensemble-kids' talent combined would not equal HALF of the talent that the boy Dayton Tavares) playing Billy Elliot has. Oh. MY. GAWD. he was perfectly casted. His accent was by far, the most convincing (well,the father's was really good too) and he had the same kind of pre-teen, boy-y, raspy-ness that the actual Billy Elliot (and by 'actual' i mean the actor from the movie) had. And he was a really good actor too! Dayton wasn't overly-'musical-theatre' which was why he was so captivating. Too much in-your-face-acting turns me off...and there was (unfortunately) a lot of that in this show as well...thankfully, not too much, because Billy was the lead but it did not go unnoticed!
Take Billy's best friend Michael. Now, I *loved* Michael when I saw the movie because he was innocent, pure, sweet and soft-spoken. So, maybe I was a bit biased when this Michael came on stage all loud and super-gay. Like, obnoxiously gay. I was like 'wait, what? what happened to the sweet little Michael I knew and loved?' And his accent was nootttt up to par with the others. I understand that accents are hard and that he was only like 13 yrs old, but then figure out a way to 'get by'. I guess in effort to be clearly understood, he said his lines super-slow and ennunciated every single word..with his awful accent. "Bill-llayyy cah-muh heee-ruhhh!" sorry kid, I kinda dreaded you speakin'. He was a good tap dancer, I'll give him that. But I thought the dance sequence with the giant mascot-like dresses was weird. The two were entertaining enough on their own!
I loved the dad. His accent was dead-on, the way he screamed all of his lines was totally in character, and I loved the "real-ness" of his acting. In fact, he almost made me cry!..but then he bust out into song, and my tears quickly recoiled. He was never supposed to be a funny character, but his stern-ness and masculinity made him funny (especially during the cigerette scene at the ballet school!) but that led to is downfall. After recieving HUGE laughs from the audience during that scene, i think he got a little attention-hungry (which is normal, ya know? once you get some laughs, you get comfortable..and a little sloppy) Because after that scene, he started to get really "joke-y" and animated, which I found dissapoining, because I loved him as the stern but tender-hearted dad. And now he was this expressive 'funny' guy?! whyyyyyyyy.
Quick note about Mrs. Wilkison: she needs red bull. Her songs were all flat, her dancing was so-so. She just wasn't memorable. She had a kind of "debbie-downer" energy which I could feel even from the cheap seats!
Overall, this show was AMAZING because of the dancing and how talented little Billy was. So sharp, so flexible, so ON POINT! My feet were getting antsy because his energy was infectious. The technical aspect of this show is worth noting too. The sets were simple and big, but they were so well-painted and put together that you didn't need much to get the feel of the scene. The bed/kitchen and table set that popped out of the floor (through trap doors) really added a lot to the stage and made for smooth transitions.
Posted by: |