Still the creepiest and kookiest family we know, the Addams Family are back – and musical.
Andrew Lippa's modern music for the weird and wonderful of
all ages is the perfect dose of family fun – for a bunch so dark it's
hilariously light-hearted. The production follows everyone's favourite
terrifying teenager Wednesday Addams as she grows up and falls in love with a 'normal' boy (much to her parents' dismay)
and we get to enjoy the nuclear fallout from the family's first 'normal' friends to the consequences of
their first ever secret.
Designer Diego Pitarch set the scene beautifully from the
moment we laid eyes on the stage with some incredible sets – everything from
ornate moving set pieces to tiny details such as moss detailing on the house's
old bricks really upped the ante for the overall eerie effect that we're so
used to with this iconic family. Even the large set pieces moved smoothly into
place creating stunning transitions you barely even noticed were taking place
and the attention to detail was remarkable. With most stage shows the
suspension of disbelief only goes so far – you know you're sitting in a theatre,
looking at a stage. But the ingenious combination of stunning set design,
seamless transitions and the perfect amount and variation of lighting really
made you feel like you were there; this was one of the most immersive front-on
productions I've seen, simply from a design perspective. A particular stand out
that really set the bar for the amount of precision put into creating the
perfect vision was a 'picture frame' on the wall at the back of the stage –
when in normal light it appeared as just a regular framed painting. However,
once illuminated we could see various characters moving into place in the
painting to watch scenes unfold, really adding to the haunted house effect that
the Addams family are so well known for.
It was easy to tell from the offset that the show was
going to be a blast; 'When You're An Addams' as the opening number was
definitely a hit – an absolutely flawless ensemble number that's still stuck in
my head the day after and makes me want to watch all over again.
Cameron Blakely's endlessly fun and slightly camp portrayal of Gomez Addams was remarkable – both laugh-out-loud funny and
heart-warmingly sensitive, Blakely certainly knew how to work a crowd and had a
voice just as captivating as his performance. He was an absolute showstopper –
quite literally, after breaking from his lovely Latin-American accent during a
rather suspenseful family dinner scene and delivering a line in a broad
Yorkshire accent infront of everyone else on stage. (Ironic, really, as this
really is the perfect show for corpsing.) Usually this would be a red mark
against any theatre production – but his comedic timing couldn't have been more
perfect and he had the entire audience (and half the cast) roaring with
laughter.
As always, by his side, his wonderful wife Morticia -
played by the incredible Joanna Clifton, who gave a spectacularly spooky
performance as the infamous gothic matriarch we all know and love. The way she
moved made her seem all the more ethereal (no surprise given Clifton's
background) but their pasodoble is what really blew me away. Her hilarious
rendition of 'Just Around The Corner' was laugh-out-loud funny, perfectly
straddling the border between endearing and ever-so -lightly unhinged. The
heads of the Addams family are well known for their everlasting love and their
passion for one each other, and this particular number really encapsulated it. The
choreography was beautiful throughout the whole show, but this number came out
on top. The chemistry between the two was bordering on sickeningly believable;
they did the perfect job of recreating one of the most beautiful (if slightly
scary) romances in entertainment history.
Special mentions are definitely deserved for Kingsley
Morton's emotional portrayal of Wednesday Addams – it's hard to play a teenage
girl in love without overdoing it, but she managed to hit the sweet spot with
this one. Each of her musical numbers was pitch perfect – Morton has a strong
voice which paired beautifully with the rest of the ensemble as there wasn't a
weak performance among them. Also deserving of more than his fair share of
admiration was Scott Paige as the loveable Uncle Fester. An absolute laugh-riot
throughout, if comedic relief was needed he would have been it - with giggles
galore from start to finish it was hard to stand out, but stand out he did.
There isn't really a negative thing to say about the
production as a whole – from the spot-on casting to the incredible live band
adding the perfect eerie overtone to the whole affair, absolutely everything
had been thought of. I went in not knowing what to expect, and came out
desperate to see it again! If you're looking for something fun, visually
spectacular and a little bit different, get booking – if it gets the reaction
it deserves, then tickets won't be around for long.
Reviewer - Hazel Kaye
on - 2.2.22
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