Tag Archives: Zoë Doano

Miss Saigon – UK Tour Casting News

PRINCIPAL CASTING AND FURTHER DATES ANNOUNCED FOR THE FORTHCOMING UK AND IRELAND TOUR OF

CAMERON MACKINTOSH’S
SPECTACULAR NEW PRODUCTION OF

BOUBLIL AND SCHÖNBERG’S LEGENDARY MUSICAL

 

OPENING AT CURVE LEICESTER ON 1 JULY 2017
FOLLOWING ITS RECORD-BREAKING LONDON RUN
AND BRILLIANT BROADWAY OPENING

 

Cameron Mackintosh is delighted to announce principal casting and further dates for the forthcoming UK and Ireland tour of his acclaimed new production of Boublil and Schönberg’s legendary musical MISS SAIGON, opening at Curve Leicester where it will play from Saturday 1 July – Saturday 22 July 2017.

Red Concepcion will play ‘The Engineer’, Sooha Kim ‘Kim’, Ashley Gilmour ‘Chris’, Zoë Doano ‘Ellen’ and Gerald Santos ‘Thuy’. At certain performances ‘Kim’ will be played by Joreen Bautista.

They are joined by David Allwood, Randy Chien, Vinny Coyle, Kristine Mae Diaz, Michael James Eborall, Aynrand Ferrer, Seng Henk Goh, Emily Beth Harrington, Jack Heasman, Tom Hier, Barnaby Hughes, Kamm Kunaree, David Kar-Hing Lee, Amanda Lingdren, Ela Lisondra, Winchester Lopez, Christian Rey Marbella, Jay Marsh, Tom Mussell, Thao Nguyen, Saori Oda, YoungJoo Park, Kiel Payton, Katherine Picar, Alistair So, Carl Jae-Suk Sohlberg, Eloisa Amalia Tan, Gavin Tsang, Amadeus Williams, and Gerald Zarcilla. Further casting to be announced soon.

In addition to the venues already announced, MISS SAIGON is now also confirmed to play the Manchester Palace Theatre (21 March – 12 May 2018), The Bristol Hippodrome (16 May – 23 June), Theatre Royal Plymouth (4 July – 4 August) and Norwich Theatre Royal (15 August – 15 September). Full details of the tour schedule to date are below with further venues to be announced soon.

Red Concepcion’s many theatre credits in his native Philippines include Adam/Felicia in Priscilla Queen of the Desert for which he won the ALIW Award and Gawah Buhay Award, Tommy in The Normal Heart and Alan Strang in Equus as well as the musicals West Side Story and Hairspray.

Sooha Kim made her professional debut in this recent production of Miss Saigon at the Prince Edward Theatre where she covered the role of Kim before going on to play the role in the Japanese production. Her credits whilst training in Korea include Maureen in Rent and Carmen in Fame.

Ashley Gilmour also appeared in Miss Saigon at the Prince Edward Theatre. His most recent credits include playing Link Larkin in the national tour of Hairspray.

Zoë Doano’s many West End theatre credits include Cosette in Les Misérables, Johanna in Sweeney Todd and most recently Grazia in Death Takes A Holiday. She has also appeared in the national tours of The Sound of Music and High Society.

Gerald Santos was the youngest ever winner of the biggest singing contest in the Philippines, Pinoy Pop Superstar. He has released five studio albums and has won numerous awards including winning twice Best Male Concert performer at the prestigious ALIW Awards.

Last week, this new production of MISS SAIGON opened on Broadway to nightly standing ovations following a smash-hit run in London’s West End. The New Yorker calls it a “Dynamite Broadway revival”. When this new production opened in London in May 2014 to record-breaking advance sales and critical acclaim, Dominic Cavendish in The Daily Telegraph wrote, “This thrilling new production spills out beyond the theatre and speaks directly to the times we live in”. The show swept the board at the 2015 Whatsonstage.com awards winning a record breaking nine awards, the most awards ever won by a single show in the 15-year history of the awards including: Best West End Show and Best Revival of a Musical.
MISS SAIGION tells the story of the last days of the Vietnam War, 17 year-old Kim is forced to work in a Saigon bar run by a notorious character known as the Engineer. There she meets and falls in love with an American GI named Chris but they are torn apart by the fall of Saigon. For 3 years Kim goes on an epic journey of survival to find her way back to Chris, who has no idea he’s fathered a son.
MISS SAIGON has music by Claude-Michel Schönberg with lyrics by Richard Maltby Jr. and Alain Boublil, adapted from original French lyrics by Alain Boublil, with additional lyrics by Michael Mahler. The new production is directed by Laurence Connor with musical staging by Bob Avian and additional choreography by Geoffrey Garratt. Production design is by Totie Driver and Matt Kinley based on an original concept by Adrian Vaux; costume design by Andreane Neofitou; lighting design by Bruno Poet; projections by Luke Halls; sound design by Mick Potter; and orchestrations by William David Brohn.
Since its London premiere in 1989, Cameron Mackintosh’s production of Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg’s legendary musical MISS SAIGON has become one of the most successful musicals in history. The original Broadway production of MISS SAIGON opened on April 11, 1991 with what was the largest advance sale in Broadway history ($37 million). The show went on to play for nearly ten years and 4,063 performances seen by more than 5.9 million people. MISS SAIGON has been performed in 28 countries, over 300 cities in 15 different languages, has won over 40 awards including 2 Olivier Awards, 3 Tony Awards, and 4 Drama Desk Awards and been seen by over 35 million people worldwide.

 

MISS SAIGON UK TOUR 2017/2018

www.miss-saigon.com

 

MONDAY 3 JULY – SATURDAY 22 JULY 2017
CURVE, LEICESTER
www.curveonline.co.uk – 0116 242 3595
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 26 JULY – SATURDAY 23 SEPTEMBER 2017
BIRMINGHAM HIPPODROME
www.birminghamhippodrome.com – 0844 338 5000
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 4 OCTOBER – SATURDAY 18 NOVEMBER 2017
BORD GAIS ENERGY THEATRE, DUBLIN
www.bordgaisenergytheatre.ie – +353 (1) 677 7999
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 29 NOVEMBER 2017 – SATURDAY 6 JANUARY 2018
WALES MILLENNIUM CENTRE, CARDIFF
www.wmc.org.uk – 029 2063 6464
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 17 JANUARY – SATURDAY 17 FEBRUARY 2018
FESTIVAL THEATRE EDINBURGH
www.edtheatres.com – 01315296000
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 21 FEBRUARY – SATURDAY 17 MARCH 2018
MAYFLOWER THEATRE, SOUTHAMPTON
www.mayflower.org.uk – 02380 711811
ON SALE NOW

WEDNESDAY 21 MARCH – SATURDAY 12 MAY 2018
MANCHESTER PALACE THEATRE
www.atgtickets.com/venues/palace-theatre-manchester/ – 0844 871 3019
ON SALE 18 MAY 2017

WEDNESDAY 16 MAY – SATURDAY 23 JUNE 2018
THE BRISTOL HIPPODROME
www.atgtickets.com/venues/bristol-hippodrome/ – 0844 871 3012
ON SALE 18 MAY 2017

WEDNESDAY 4 JULY – SATURDAY 4 AUGUST 2018
THEATRE ROYAL PLYMOUTH
http://www.theatreroyal.com/ – 01752 267222
ON SALE 18 MAY 2017

WEDNESDAY 15 AUGUST – SATURDAY 15 SEPTEMBER 2018
NORWICH THEATRE ROYAL
www.theatreroyalnorwich.co.uk 01603 63 00 00
ON SALE 21 AUGUST 2017

 

 

 

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Death Takes a Holiday 4*

 

Death Takes a Holiday

Charing Cross Theatre

25 January 2017

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

“A musical journey of emotions from melancholy to merriment”

The story of Death taking human form and having a weekend away from his Grim Reaper duties may not appear to be the most promising, nor cheery, storyline for a musical. Had Thom Southerland, director of Death Takes a Holiday  and the well regarded artistic director of Charing Cross Theatre, made the right choice for opening the 2017 season?

Based on the 1924 play La Morte in Vacanza by Alberto Casella, ‘Death Take a Holiday’  has had a few incarnations since. It was first a Broadway play, then a film in the 1930s, a TV movie in the early 70s and reinvented as Meet Joe Black for another cinema airing in 1998. a musical version was conceived in 1997 and eventually had a short off Broadway run in 2011. It’s a version of the latter that we have now, with a book by Thomas Meenan and Peter Stone and music and lyrics by Maury Yeston. 

From the first note of the opening act, it feels that this is going to be a big production and that feeling does last throughout. Although the stage is small and the scenery (set design by Morgan Large) simple yet charming, this does feel like you’re watching something much bigger but it never feels as if its punching above its weight.
Maury Yeston’s score certainly has a variety of styles to it; heavily orchestral in places, jazzy in others. On the whole, the style of each song works to portray the mood of the scene perfectly, the audience taken on a musical journey of emotions from melancholy to merriment.

The first act does a lot of scene setting and had a lot of songs; indeed perhaps one too many songs, to the point that occasionally Death take a Holiday seemed to have delusions of being a sung through musical. Some of the back stories (such as how Major Fenton thought he knew Prince Sirki (Death’s alter ego)), felt slightly drawn out and didn’t add a lot to the action. But characters were mostly believable and well acted. Special mentions to James Gant as the slightly awkward butler, Fidele, Ashley Stillburn as the stroppy spurned Corrado and Scarlett Courtney as the delightful Daisy.
The second act came across as much punchier. The musical numbers, though fewer, were stronger and more meaningful. The storyline picked up a pace and although act one was fine, this was a much more enjoyable watch.

The production came with a highly accomplished cast, the two leads both formerly principals in two West End heavyweights – Zoë Doano as Grazia (Cosette in Les Miserables) and Chris Peluso as Death/Prince Sirki (Chris in Miss Saigon). As expected these two delivered; their voices both amazing, at times making the hairs on your neck stand up. Their duet, More and More, being the stand out vocal performance of the show.
Death Takes a Holiday deals with an immortal entity experiencing human feelings and emotions for the first time. These range from comic, such as when Prince Sirki’s maid brings him his towels and the reaction that gives him, to the extremely touching moments as he falls for Grazia. It may have made the plot more powerful if we could have seen a bit more of Death’s dark side along the way.

The emotional scenes aren’t limited to the leads, the song ‘December Time’ between the elderly Evangelina (Gay Soper) and Baron Albione (Anthony Cable) is both sweet and beautifully sung.
Although a little drawn out in places and needing a sprinkle more of malevolence,  this is generally an enjoyable show with some strong performances.

 

Photography Scott Rylander

 

Death Takes a Holiday is at the Charing Cross Theatre

until 4th March

 

Chris Peluso is appearing until 11th February