Little Shop Of Horrors

Synopsis

A blood sucking, flesh eating plant from outer-space called Audrey and Seymour the florists assistant provides high comedy in this cult musical. Songs such as "Feed Me" and "Who'd Be A Dentist".

Latest User Review

Clive Fuller - 4 September 2010:

Birmingham Repertory Theatre Company presents Little Shop of Horrors Birmingham Rep, Friday 3 September 2010 On a sunny September night a mysterious plant took over Birmingham Rep for a wacky evening of fun and spectacle. It was certainly business as usual at the theatre this evening although next door is the building site that will become the new library. A near capacity audience was entranced and entertained by the talented cast assembled to play this revival of the Off Broadway hit of 1982 “Little Shop of Horrors”. Originally the show was the long running science fiction, camp and somewhat oddball musical that caught on with a huge audience in the early 1980s clocking up over 2000 performances and a movie version in 1986. With libretto by Howard Ashman and music by Alan Menken the musical play is based upon a Roger Corman horror film. This Birmingham Rep production sees the directorial debut of Peter Rowe who has had considerable success as Artistic Director at Ipswich with the Wolsey Theatre. His production has pace and delivers the story through a colourful set and excellent costumes designed by Mark Walters. The music and songs whilst not that familiar are rhythmic and told the story of this human flesh eating plant with humour and a little tongue in cheek horror. The musicians were excellent and many of the actors also played in the band so it was very much a team effort that worked very well. There was plenty of dancing and vocalising and this musical seemed to contain so much that was so good. My only concern was that some of the dialogue was lost particularly in Act 1 as the balance between the musicians and the actors was not quite right and this improved considerably in Act 2. The principals, James Haggie as Seymour the rather naive flower shop assistant; Shirley Darroch as dizzy blonde shop assistant Audrey; Harry Myers as Mr Mushnik the shop owner and Sean Kingsley as dentist Orin were perfectly cast and got a good rapport going with the audience as one by one they disappeared into the monster plants mouth! The voice of Audrey II (Cavin Cornwall) is very deep and resonates around the auditorium with “feed me” but watch out for its tentacles as they move along to the music. The three girl singers Raquel Jones; Tania Mathurin and Emi Wokoma were outstanding and the costumes for them were at time reminiscent of The Three Degrees. The show certainly deserves a UK tour... The running time was 2 hours and 20 minutes including the interval. The show runs until 18 September 2010. ...

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