Features

Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll – Number 1 – Les Miserables

Features, Les Miserables musical West End - Les Miserables London tickets
Les Miserables 30th Aniversary - Queens Theatre London

Les Miserables has topped our 100 Greatest Musicals Poll by several thousand votes. The epic musical retelling of Victor Hugo’s classic novel has music by Claude-Michel Schonberg and French lyrics by Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel translated into English by Herbert Kretzmer and additional lyrics by James Fenton. The musical which was produced by Cameron Mackintosh in association with the Royal Shakespeare Company was carefully crafted by co-directors John Caird and Trevor Nunn. Few suspected when it opened to less than gushing reviews at London’s Barbican Centre that it would become the blockbuster sensation that it did, but the public warmed to its humanity and story of triumph over adversity. The show transferred to London’s Palace Theatre in 1985 and opened on Broadway in 1987. Included in the show’s original London cast were Colm Wilkinson, Roger Allam, Patti LuPone, David Burt, Micheal Ball, Frances Ruffelle, Alan Armstrong, Susan Jane Tanner … Read more

Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll – Number 2 – Wicked

Features, Wicked the musical
Book tickets for Wicked at the Apollo Victoria Theatre

It’s been great to see two relatively new musicals make it into our  Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll. Firstly with Hamilton and now taking our Number Two spot – Wicked! Based on the book Wicked: The Life And Times Of The Wicked Witch Of The West by Gregory Maguire, Wicked the musical has music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman. Wicked arrived on Broadway in 2003 at the Gershwin Theatre where it still resides after a try-out in San Francisco with a cast including Kristen Chenoweth as Glinda, Idina Menzel as Elphaba and Joel Grey as The Wizard. Millions of people have now seen Wicked around the world and a major movie adaptation in currently in the works. Wicked has won three Tony Awards and six Drama Desk Awards and its original cast album won a Grammy Award. Over a decade after its premiere, Wicked … Read more

Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll – Number 3 – The Phantom Of The Opera – Miss Saigon

Features, The Phantom Of The Opera
Miss Saigon and The Phantom Of The Opera ties for 3rd place in the Top 100 Greatest musicals poll

It was perhaps inevitable when you open up a public vote like this one that there is a chance of a tie somewhere along the line and such was the case with our Number 3 position when The Phantom Of The Opera and Miss Saigon recieved exactly the same number of votes. The Phantom Of The Opera features music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Charles Hart with additional lyrics by Richard Stilgoe. Phantom is based on Le Fantome del l’Opera by Gaston Leroux. Opening in London’s West End in 1986, on Broadway in 1988 and in Melbourne in 1990, The Phantom Of The Opera won the 1986 Olivier Award and the 1988 Tony Award for Best Musical. In London and on Broadway the show featured Michael Crawford in the title role with Sarah Brightman playing Christine Daae. Phantom’s incredible direction and design brilliance were down to Harold Prince … Read more

Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll – Number 4 – The Lion King

Features, Long-running Musicals in London's West End, The Lion King Musical West End - The Lion King London tickets
The Lion King Lyceum Theatre

Based on the 1994 Disney animated film of the same name, The Lion King features music by Elton John, lyrics by Tim Rice, musical score by Hans Zimmer and choral arrangements by Lebo M. Under the direction of visionary director Julie Taymor, who combined puppetry, with ground-breaking stagecraft, The Lion King soon became of the most popular stage musicals around the world. Opening on Broadway in 1997, it is now Broadway’s third-longest running show in history and the highest grossing Broadway production of all time. The London production opening in 1999 and is still running. The show became the highest earning show in box-office history for both stage and film in 2014 when it surpassed The Phantom Of The Opera. The Broadway Production of The Lion King won 6 Tony Awards including Best Musical and 8 Drama Desk Awards. Productions of The Lion King have now been seen across the … Read more

Top 100 Greatest Musicals Poll – Number 5 – Hamilton

Features, Hamilton The Musical
Hamilton musical

There can be very few people in the world who have not heard of Hamilton: An American Musical. With book, music and lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda, Hamilton is a musical based on the life of American founding father Alexander Hamilton, best known to many as the face on the US $10 bill. Whilst Miranda’s original intention was to release the score as a concept album which he was planning to call The Hamilton Mixtapes, Hamilton made its stage debut Off-Broadway at the Public Theatre in February 2015 before transferring to Broadway’s Richard Rodgers Theatre later that year. Critically acclaimed Hamilton received a record-breaking 16 Tony Award nominations winning 11 including Best Musical. It won the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theatre Album, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and seven Drama Desk Awards including Outstanding Musical. With the Broadway production still playing to sold out houses, several US national tours crossing … Read more

THEATER TALK: 2017 Tony Awards Predictions

Broadway, Features
2017 Tony Award Predictions Theater Talk

With the 2017 Tony Awards being held tomorrow our friends at Theater Talk assembled their famed critics panel to discuss their Tony Award Predictions. The panel consisting of hosts Susan Haskins, New York Times columnist Michael Riedel, Elisabeth Vincentelli (The New Yorker and The New York Times), Patrick Pacheco (OnStage), Jesse Green (The New York Times), and Michael Musto (Out.com) seemed fairly unanimous in many of their predictions. We are interested to hear your thoughts on who will win this year. Kevin Spacey will be hosting the 71st annual Tony Awards ceremony, on Sunday, June 11, at 8 pm Eastern on CBS.We will be posting updates live here on BritishTheatre.com LOOK AT THE FULL LIST OF 2017 TONY AWARDS NOMINEES

The Band announces cast as box office tops 10 million

Features, News, Touring
Full casting announced for The Band Uk Tour

The full cast for David Pugh & Dafydd Rogers and Take That’s UK Tour of Tim Firth’s new musical, The Band, featuring the music of Take That.has been announced as the tour of the new musical is now topped a record-breaking ten million pounds. Joining the previously announced AJ Bentley, Nick Carsberg, Curtis T Johns, Yazdan Qafouri and Sario Solomon, collectively known as 5 to 5, winners of BBC’s Let It Shine, who will play The Band, Rachel Lumberg as Rachel and Faye Christall as Young Rachel, will be Emily Joyce as Heather, Alison Fitzjohn as Claire, Jayne McKenna as Zoe, Katy Clayton as Young Heather, Sarah Kate Howarth as Young Claire, Lauren Jacobs as Young Zoe, Rachelle Diedericks as Debbie,Martin Miller as Jeff and Andy Williams as Dave. The Band is a new musical about what it’s like to grow up with a boyband.  For five 16 year-old friends in 1992, ‘the band’ is … Read more

Traverse reveals premieres for Edinburgh Festival

Edinburgh Fringe, Features, News
Jess and Joe Forever at Edinburgh Festival 2017

The Traverse Theatre has revealed a programme of eight world premieres, three European premieres and five Scottish premieres for this year’s Edinburgh festival. The world premieres include Meet Me at Dawn by Zinnie Harris, directed by the Traverse’s artistic director Orla O’Loughlin, exploring everyday love and unexpected loss, inspired by the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Another world premiere will be The Whip Hand by Douglas Maxwell with Birmingham Repertory Theatre and National Theatre of Scotland. Directed by Birmingham Rep associate director Tessa Walker, it is a family drama set in Glasgow, exploring themes of power, privilege, blood ties and our inescapable past. In association with Glasgow’s Tron Theatre, another world premiere will be Letters to Morrissey by Gary McNair, part of the Made in Scotland showcase. Performed by McNair, the solo show is the third in a trilogy about growing up in working-class Scotland after his sell-out festival hit … Read more