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Disney's Beauty And The Beast
Presented by: PLOS
Venue:
The Frankston Arts Centre
Reviewer: Emmalee Bell
Date Reviewed: 21st July 2007
With its injection of Disney magic, you cannot fail to be enchanted
by Disney’s Beauty and the Beast. Lavish costumes, visual
effects and spectacular sets bring to life the story of Belle, a
head-strong young woman who is made a prisoner by an ugly Beast, in
his enchanted castle. Unless the Beast can learn to love and be
loved in return, he and his staff (who are morphing into household
objects) will be forever doomed to their sorry existence.
The production team of Mark Raynes (Director), Kristy Kendall
(Director/ Choreographer) and Sue Fletcher (Musical Director) tackle
the challenge of presenting a much-loved story head-on and certainly
do justice to their production of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.
This production was exceptionally well-cast with every leading
character looking, sounding and acting the part of their individual
roles. I was quite astounded by the richness of talent!
Emily Doran was clearly born to play Belle, giving a natural and
endearing performance. I was very impressed with the chemistry that
Emily created with her fellow performers, particularly with her
father, Maurice (Colin Armstrong) and of course with the Beast. A
highlight of Emily’s performance was Belle’s song “A Change in Me”.
I normally find this song (not featured in the original motion
picture) pointless and bland, however the emotion that Emily put
into the song made me feel, for the first time, that it has an
important place in the story.
Mike Gardiner as the Beast handled the complexities of the character
well, showing the Beast’s ferocity while allowing the audience to
see shades of the gentle, caring man he eventually becomes. Mike
chose to play the Beast with a simmering rage, subjecting the
audience to an unnerving sense of anticipation for the inevitable
explosion. Mike gave a beautiful rendition of “If I Can’t Love Her”
drawing the audience in with his wonderful voice and a strong
physicality. I would however, have liked to see the same
physicality carried through the entire performance.
The supporting cast of characters including Gaston (Anthony Scundi),
Lefou (Matt Perfect), Cogsworth (Danny Ginsberg), Mrs Potts (Shirley
Bowen), Lumiere (Peter Jenkins), Babette (Maree Barnett), Madame de
la Grande Bouche (Pam Charleston) and Maurice (Colin Armstrong) all
gave such outstanding performances that I wish I could comment
individually on each one, however I fear that I do not have enough
superlatives in my vocabulary to do so.
The only disappointing aspect of this production was a lack of vocal
power in big Ensemble numbers. I think that this was probably a
sound issue and perhaps there was not enough microphones for the
Ensemble. It also felt to me that there were no speakers at the rear
of the auditorium, resulting in very low sound levels at times.
Otherwise the Ensemble did a wonderful job of giving life to the
production with a colourful array of townspeople/household object
characters and tight execution of the choreography.
I
would now like to have a little preach about attention to detail.
There were a number of unusual goings on that distracted me from the
performance;
·
During “Belle” there were two girls wandering the stage reading
books, weakening the idea that Belle is considered odd for reading.
·
When the girls were turned upside down in a couple of dance numbers
some of them had flesh coloured underpants under stockings and
appeared to naked under their skirts!
·
There were a number of times where you could see directly into the
back-stage area and see the back-stage crew chatting away to each
other.
·
Some of the bottom pinching, cleavage adjusting, mock-fighting
antics from ensemble members in the back-ground, while very
entertaining, pulled focus from the scene.
I
loathe sounding too negative, however when a production is as slick
as this one, the little things can tend to stand out like a sore
thumb and prevent the production from reaching that elusive near
flawless level.
I
hope that Beauty and the Beast can be a box-office success
for PLOS, as there are a lot of shows competing for ticket sales at
this time of year. Beauty and the Beast is a visually
stunning production that is fun, entertaining and well worth a look.
Emmalee’s passion for musical theatre developed in Warrnambool where
she performed in 20 productions over a 10-year period. While
studying Arts Management at WAPPA, Emmalee performed at the Regent
Theatre in Les Miserables and the King and I. Since returning to
Victoria, Emmalee has been in productions of Ragtime, Into the Woods
(Baker’s Wife), The Sound of Music (Maria), was a Pit Singer for
CLOC’s Cats and played Frauline Kost in ARC’s Cabaret.. Emmalee is
currently rehearsing for The Producers with Whitehorse Musical
Theatre. |