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Performance times are: Mon-Thu 19:30. Fri 17:30, 20:30. Sat 16:00, 20:00
Synopsis
The “insanely fun” (New York Time Out ) worldwide smash hit Rock if Ages features a hilarious mix of 28 eyebrow-scorching tunes including Don’t Stop Believin’, We Built This City, The Final Countdown, Wanted Dead Or Alive, Here I Go Again, Can’t Fight This Feeling and I Want To Know What Love Is.
Set in LA’s infamous Sunset Strip in 1987, Rock of Ages tells the story of Drew, a boy from South Detroit, and Sherrie, a small-town girl, both in LA to chase their dreams of making it big and falling in love. ROCK OF AGES takes you back to the times of big bands with big egos playing big guitar solos and sporting even bigger hair!
The Rock of Ages show premiered in Los Angeles at The Vanguard Hollywood in January 2006 where it played for six weeks and was first seen in New York at the off-Broadway New World Stages in 2008. The production transferred to The Brooks Atkinson Theatre Broadway in 2009 and transferred to the Helen Hayes Theatre in 2011. The Rock of Ages theatre in London is the Shaftesbury Theatre.
The Rock of Ages cast is led by West End stars Oliver Tompsett (best known from his long stint as Fiyero in Wicked) and Amy Pemberton (Footloose, Jersey Boys) will play the leads of small-town boy and girl Drew and Sherrie who fall in love. The are joined by West End regular Simon Lipkin (Avenue Q), TV and radio presenter Justin Lee Collins and former X Factor winner Shayne Ward.
Whatsonstage.com have some great, cheap Rock of Ages tickets so don’t miss this awesomely good time about dreaming big, playing loud and partying on!
Contains strobe lighting and adult themes. Parental Guidance recommended.
Broadway import Rock of Ages opened to press last night (28 September 2011, previews from 31 August) at the Shaftesbury Theatre.
Set on LA’s infamous Sunset Strip in 1987, Rock of Ages tells the story of Drew, a boy from South Detroit, and Sherrie, a small-town girl, both in LA to chase their dreams of making it big and falling in love.
Starring X Factor winner Shayne Ward, TV presenter Justin Lee Collins and West End regulars Amy Pemberton and Oliver Tompsett, the arena-rock musical features hit songs like "Don’t Stop Believin’", "We Built This City", "The Final Countdown", "Here I Go Again" and "Can’t Fight This Feeling".
"There are very few musical theatre shows that are beyond critical evaluation, but Rock of Ages is probably one of them. It’s a question, really, of whether the audience for heavy-metal glam rock will find their way to the Shaftesbury to enjoy exactly the sort of music they already relish ... there were, I confess, one or two moments when I felt my ignorance was shameful; some of it was indeed very good, and very loud, and very rude, if you like that sort of thing. But I was more intrigued to note that yet another member of a great theatrical dynasty, Zizi Strallen, was strutting her stuff. The X Factor winner of several years ago, Shayne Ward, was off as the band leader on the press performance I attended, but nobody seemed to mind too much. Simon Lipkin is an impressive emcee, and actually quite funny. ... Nothing I can say will either propel you to the Shaftesbury or deter you from joining in. Now please excuse me while I lie down in a dark room for a couple of days."
"This is as unpleasant a pile of theatrical poo as it has ever been my misfortune to tread in ... Its aim is to celebrate the glam metal bands of the period, a genre sometimes known as 'poodle rock' because of the absurd blow-dried hairstyles of many of its leading practitioners. It was always a particularly naff form of popular music, much given to both maudlin power ballads and brain-dead rock-outs with lots of shrieking guitars. The big surprise is that this dire show, with its fatuous storyline ... has received a warm welcome in some quarters. The show’s book by Chris D’Arienzo is inanely predictable, lamentably written and surprisingly sordid, with its tale of how sweet innocent Sherrie is seduced and promptly dumped by a rock god called Stacee Jaxx ... The jokes are unfunny, the story both predictable and appallingly written, while the acting ... is dismal. I usually have a soft spot for cheesy sleaze, but there is something repellent about this show’s leering manner, while the subplot involving a crude caricatured German property developer, who wants to demolish Sunset Strip, and his outrageously camp son proves as infantile as it is unfunny."
"It's a very peculiar show indeed, with an unvarying and unpleasant tone of careless sexualisation. Rock'n'roll debauchery is presented as the pure and innocent way of dreamers ... Aside from the female lead ... women exist only to parade in underwear, as hookers, strippers or waitresses, and Sherrie has to take on two of those jobs. The furthest it strays from stereotype is to reveal the developer's camp son Fritz as straight ... and to use REO Speedwagon's "I Can't Fight This Feeling" to celebrate two men discovering their love for each other, though it is a shame that scene is played for comedy rather than tenderness. The book ... is as shallow as the scene it supposedly sends up. Worse, it is almost entirely free of laughs, reliant on frequent recourse to the use of props such as prosthetic penises, and Lonny, the narrator (Simon Lipkin) wearing a T-shirt bearing the legend 'Hooray for boobies'. When he bemoans being 'lured to narrate a show with poop jokes and Whitesnake songs', one feels like commiserating."
"More a mixtape than a juke-box musical, it manages to both glory in and lampoon the clichés of the rock genres it's built on, with knowing nods to Axl Rose and David Lee Roth, and the odd X-rated joke about groupies and ping-pong balls, and wipes the floor with the Queen vehicle. The storyline D'Arienzo has weaved around the 30 timewarp rock tracks is enjoyable in its very predictability ... An irritant on television and on the radio, Justin Lee Collins is more personable and in his element as Dupree ... Rachel McFarlane ... steals the show with her soulful voice. Best is the mullet-sporting Simon Lipkin as Lonny, Dupree's bartending sidekick, who constantly breaks the fourth wall. The way D'Arienzo intertwines the hits as characters interact – most effectively when Sherrie sings Joan Jett's I Hate Myself For Loving You and Drew and Stacee reply with Asia's Heat of the Moment during a rollicking second act – proves infectious. The pseudo-rebellious stance of Rock of Ages doesn't bear much scrutiny, but as a feelgood, singalong, rock'n'roll musical it's hard to fault. The most fun I've had at a musical since Jersey Boys. "
"Back then the ridiculous macho posturing while wearing clothes even Elton John found over the top was looked on as not so much a genre of music, than its unfortunate illegitimate child. This hit Broadway musical is cheesier than a wagon load of Cathedral City dumped in the blazing sun, camper than a Dale Winton convention. Everyone knows the gossamer thin plot is there to service a succession of good gags before hurtling straight into another power anthem. X Factor (brief) winner Shayne Ward plays rock god Stacee Jaxx, and he makes a good job of it. Even Justin Lee Collins isn’t anywhere near as annoying as he usually is as club owner Dennis. But it is the lesser names that shine, especially Oliver Tompsett as Drew and Simon Lipkin as Lonny. Rock of Ages is a hugely enjoyable evening celebrating a time and music we should really leave behind, but can’t. It will rock your world, not arf!"
Dominic Maxwell The Times ★★
"Fluff up your peroxide poodle perm, slide on your sleeveless Spandex T-shirt, stick on your studded leather jacket ... and get ready for a rotten letdown. Something must have got lost in translation. For this cheerfully cheesy evocation of Los Angeles’s Sunset Strip ... satisfies neither as a spoof nor as a celebration. I know, I know, it’s just a bit of fun, dude ... The story is corny, the jokes about how corny the story is aren’t enough compensation, and the cast commit the cardinal sin of looking as if they are trying to be funny. There’s nothing rock’n’roll about trying so hard to please. Justin Lee Collins stands out for sinking into his character of Dennis ... while ... Shayne Ward looks the part as rock god Stacee Jaxx ... he acts it with no conviction. He’s there to get between our heroes Drew (Oliver Tompsett) ... and Sherrie (Amy Pemberton) ... They all sing nicely ... No one really seizes this material and has fun with it, makes it their own. Chris D’Arienzo’s script has some funny touches and some pretty blunt ones too. Find his humour cloying and effortful and you’d be better off staying at home with your copy of Slippery When Wet. Kristin Hanggi’s production is colourful, at least, and there are one or two moments in the second half where the music does the talking. Yet mostly this mix of anonymous anthemry, underplotting, overwriting and overplaying left me Cold as Ice. And no, they didn’t play that one."
"The Shaftesbury Theatre has garnered something of a reputation as the graveyard of musicals. The likes of Napoleon and Daddy Cool disappeared without trace and shall be followed shortly, I suspect, by Rock Of Ages ... Since 'comedy' German accents and campness are never not funny, thank heavens for the subplot about evil German town planners who want to demolish the Strip. Director Kristin Hanggi, astonishingly nominated for a Tony Award for her work, has come up with a frantic, unlovely production that does what all insecure creatures do and talks incessantly without pausing for thought. Ward, X Factor winner in 2005, and TV presenter Justin Lee Collins ... are the headline names, but they feature little, mercifully so in Lee Collins's case. Instead it's largely left to the helpless Pemberton and Tompsett to grind through 31 identical-sounding songs. The best line of the night comes from nowhere near Chris D'Arienzo's book (book? Back of a beer mat in the Bourbon Room, more like) but from a programme note by music writer Dave Everley ... The Rock of Ages stars shrugged off poor first night reviews, insisting they will keep performing as long as audiences enjoy the musical."
There are very few musical theatre shows that are beyond critical evaluation, but Rock of Ages is probably one of them. It’s a question, really, of whether the audience for heavy-metal glam rock will find their way to the Shaftesbury to enjoy exactly the sort of music they already relish.
I’m not necessarily averse to this stuff, but I need audio sur-titles. I may as well be watching Shakespeare in Urdu or Mozart in Mongolian. The only critical tactic to adopt is one of either submission or resentment, and I veered violently between both conditions as the music crashed about me like huge waves on Surfers’ Paradise.
Every now and then I waved my pretend cigarette lighter in a futile gesture of participation as I’d long since given up trying to make notes about the plot, or detailed analysis of the musicology.
Ah, the plot, I nearly lost it: this involves a love story going slightly skewwhiff in a Hollywood music club, the Bourbon Room; a German property developer and his camp blond son aiming to “clean up” the Sunset Strip; and the fortunes of a resident band called Stacee Jaxx and the Arsenal. As a Spurs supporter, I’m sorry to say they win through.
I tried to enter the spirit of the evening by taking along my friend, Peter Straker, who graced the original cast list of the very first rock tribal musical, Hair, in this self-same theatre. He responded positively to the level of rock music performance and pointed out to me that this jukebox compilation did indeed cover the cultural waterfront as far as heavy metal glam rock goes.
We had, I’m assured, big time all-time hits from Bon Jovi, Whitesnake, Meat Loaf, Starship, AC/DC, Foreigner and Extreme, and there were, I confess, one or two moments when I felt my ignorance was shameful; some of it was indeed very good, and very loud, and very rude, if you like that sort of thing.
But I was more intrigued to note that yet another member of a great theatrical dynasty, Zizi Strallen, was strutting her stuff. The X Factor winner of several years ago, Shayne Ward, was off as the band leader on the press performance I attended, but nobody seemed to mind too much. Simon Lipkin is an impressive emcee, and actually quite funny.
Chris D'Arienzo’s book makes no bones about following one big noisy number with another; in comparison, Mamma Mia! is as subtle as a late Henry James novel. And the direction and choreography by Kristin Hanggi and Kelly Devine has an up-front honesty and vigour that is almost disarming.
Nothing I can say will either propel you to the Shaftesbury or deter you from joining in. Now please excuse me while I lie down in a dark room for a couple of days.
Theatre addicts like me can get a bit desperate in January. The lack of new shows and the profusion of deals encourage a recklessness that leads to going to good shows again or trying ify ones…..and so it was with this…..
The surprise was that I thought it was rather good fun. It’s not my favourite musical period or genre, but the fact that it’s well staged and performed and that it sends itself up mercilessly made it worth the visit.
The book is marginally better than We Will Rock You – where that show has a banality index of 10 (max), this one’s 8. A rock club is threatened with closure because a nasty German businessman wants to pull down and redevelop the whole block. Oh, and there’s an on-off love story between the waiter and the waitress (who moonlights as an exotic dancer; cue scantily clad ladies pole dancing), and of course, it has a happy ending.
The rock soundtrack is sung and played extremely well and there’s masses of neon, fireworks, glitter balls and things that fall from the ceiling into the auditorium. If its tongue were not firmly in its cheek, it would be brash, crude and misogynistic - well, it is brash, crude and misogynistic, but in a self deprecating and somewhat harmless way.
They must have been trying out understudys as we had five, including some of the leads, but without that slip of paper (and, sadly,knowing what Shane Warne actually looks like), you’d never know it. It’s very slickly staged and choreographed and the sound is excellent – a lot lot better than Matilda down the road.
Maybe dull Januarys have a purpose after all. - Gareth James
22 Jan 12
My wife and I saw this show as a joint birthday present, we're both fans of west end musicals and I am unashamedly a fan of the bands whose songs appeared in the show.
What a great show with some stellar performances from the cast and band. The actors who played Lonny, Drew and Sherrie were superb. Justin Lee COLLINS and Shayne WARD were first class and the ensemble worked their socks off to support the main characters. In short, this is one of the most energetic shows we've seen for a long time.
Credit must also go to the guys in the band who played some great 80s rock and metal songs superbly. The actors who sang the songs could all go out and make albums tomorrow....I know that Shayne's already done that but you know what I mean!!!
Is this show camp....Yes!
Is this show funny...Yes!
Is the music good ...Yes!
Show you go and see it...Yes!!!!
This is a feel good musical and with all the doom and gloom around at the moment, go and brighten up your day or weekend by seeing this. It will make you wanna rock, and if you had long hair and loved Poison etc in their hay day, then you will shed a tear for those halcyon days....just like I did!
Rock On!!!! - Jock
08 Jan 12
Best night out i have had in ages, good to have a laugh,smiled all the way through, left with a good feeling, met the cast after got loads of pictures,if lived in London would go again. - Pauline Heron
18 Nov 11
Went to see this at the weekend and had a great time. The whole audience joined in on the singing and waving of our pretend lighters and it was a full house! Go and see this if you're up for some fun! Only downpoint was that shayne didn't sing that's my goal! - Ann
15 Nov 11
Had high hopes for this but was very disappointed. The show is dire, the book is poor and the whole production is not west end standard at all. Can't see it lasting much longer, the upper circle was closed and the stalls/dress circle were only half full...says it all really. Definitely one to avoid. - Sam
28 Oct 11
Am amazed at how what is essentially a campy, fun musical is dividing people. I had an absolute ball, and this is not really my kind of music. The cast are sensational, the script is cheesily and cheekily funny, and the songs and staging are massively exhularating. Can't wait to see it again. - ajh
03 Oct 11
Quite disappointing and will be surprised if it lasts. I thought Shayne and Justin Lee were both wasted in their roles. Considering the great new shows that have had to close like Betty Blue Eyes and Lend Me A Tenor, I can not see this going on for long - Joe Spiteri
02 Oct 11
A fun night out, dont take things so seriously its called having a good time,look how long we will rock you has run and it was slated.
- Bob
29 Sep 11
Absolute fun from start to finish. It makes no apologies for being a jukebox rock musical comedy. Seen it twice and seeing it again. My 65 year-old mother (and huge theatre fan of may years) was up and dancing and she's returning to see it again as well. - Matt
The first theatre to open in Shaftesbury Avenue on 20 Oct 1888. The original theatre was destroyed by bombs in 1941. A second theatre opened 26 Dec 1911 (originally the Prince's), badly damaged in 1940/41. Changed name to Shaftesbury in 1963. Housed the famous Hair performances in 1968. 1404 seats. Member of the Society of London Theatre.
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