O’Carroll gets course
November 8, 2007
We all know Brendan O’Carroll as Mrs Brown the Irish widow with a dysfunctional family and 2008 see the launch of his forth play in the Mrs Browns trilogy (his words)!
But his first play, ‘The Course’, was a huge success, running for 18 months at Dublin’s Tivoli Theatre, before touring to London, Birmingham, Manchester, Glasgow and Toronto and finishing up in the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin for another two months. Finally it arrives in Newcastle where O’Carroll has built up a large fan base due to Mrs. Brown.
The play involves an assorted group of no hopers who sign on for a Positive Mental Attitude course run by a conman but then the bona fide American supervisor arrives, threatening to shut down the course unless five out of six participants pass the test. The participants including a prostitute, a resting actor and a golf widow rise to the challenge, with unexpected results.
South Pacific
November 7, 2007
Sunderland Empire Nov 6th-10th and tour
Taking the stories of a Pulitzer Prize winning author James Michener and turning them into a musical may not seem to be the most thrilling subject to base a show on but who can argue with the longevity of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific .
This show is a crowd pleaser and therefore often revived by amateur operatic companies, but it is too long since the last major professional production toured , starring Gemma Craven as Nellie and Beatrice Reading as Bloody Mary.
An enchanted evening in Sunderland?
November 5, 2007
The Rodgers and Hammerstein score of South Pacific will fill the Sunderland Empire from tomorrow (Nov 6th ) until Saturday. Not only will this score be remembered though, as leading lady Helena Blackman was runner up in the TV show “How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria”, which was won by Connie Fisher , the prize being to appear as Maria, in the London Palladium revival of The Sound of Music (of course another Rodgers and Hammerstein score).
In the show we have songs such as I’m Going To Wash That Man Right Out Of My Hair, Some Enchanted Evening and There’s Nothing Like A Dame to keep us tapping our feet and transporting the audience on a dark cold night in Wearside to the sunnier climate of South Pacific.
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