Wednesday 25 September 2013

Celebrate Musicals Week: Miss Saigon Trivia Quiz!

I love quizzes, so I decided to make one where you can test your knowledge of Miss Saigon! I'll be posting the right answers on Saturday, when Celebrate Musicals Week comes to an end. Till then, you can send your answers through this post's comments! Well, of course I can't stop you from keeping your answers to yourself, but all bloggers love to see comments on their posts! And on Saturday, the one who reached the highest score will get... An honorary mention and eternal glory. (I'm sorry, were you expecting to get tickets to the show?) There won't be much point in quizzing if you all go and Google the answers, so please play nice :) However, checking out my previous Miss Saigon posts for possible hints is by all means allowed!

Now go and have fun with the quiz little dears – I will go "engineer"...



1. Where did Claude-Michel Schönberg get the inspiration to create Miss Saigon?
a) He met an old Vietnamese woman who shared her memories of the Vietnam War.
b) He saw a picture of a Vietnamese mother leaving her child with an American GI.
c) He made a trip to Ho Chi Minh City.

2. Which opera is Miss Saigon based on?
a) La Bohème
b) Carmen
c) Madame Butterfly

3. Which character sings If You Want To Die In Bed?
a) the Engineer
b) John
c) Kim

4. In which West End theatre did Miss Saigon originally play?
a) Theatre Royal, Drury Lane
b) Prince Edward Theatre
c) Apollo Theatre

5. The Last Night of the World is
a) a solo
b) a duet
c) an ensemble number

6. In 2014 when Miss Saigon returns to London, how many years will it have been since its first opening?
a) 15 years
b) 20 years
c) 25 years

7. Lea Salonga first auditioned for Miss Saigon in
a) Los Angeles
b) London
c) Manila

8. Monique Wilson was an understudy for Kim and also played the role of the bar girl
a) Mimi
b) Gigi
c) Yvette

9. What is the name of Kim's cousin whom she was supposed to marry?
a) Tam
b) Thuy
c) Tranh

10. What locations does Miss Saigon take place in?
a) Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City and Bangkok
b) Bankok and Singapore
c) Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi

11. How many characters die on stage in Miss Saigon?
a) One
b) Two
c) Four

12. There is a song in Miss Saigon called The Morning of the...
a) Phoenix
b) Battle
c) Dragon

13. Who was elected Miss Saigon at the Engineer's night club?
a) Gigi
b) Yvonne
c) Kim

14. What is the Engineer's night club at the beginning of Miss Saigon called?
a) American Dream
b) Dreamland
c) Saigon Ladies

15. The Engineer is half Vietnamese and half...
a) Dutch
b) American
c) French

16. Fill in the lyrics: "Vietnam, hey look I mean you no offence. But why..."
a) does everything make sense
b) does nothing here make sense
c) does no-one here have sense

17. The lyrics from the previous question are from
a) Why God Why?
b) The Heat Is On In Saigon
c) Now That I've Seen Her

18. What is Chris' vocal range?
a) tenor
b) baritenor
c) baritone

19. In the new production there will be a song called Maybe, sung by
a) Ellen
b) Chris
c) Kim

20. Which of these can be seen on stage in Miss Saigon?
a) a train
b) a truck
c) a helicopter

Tuesday 24 September 2013

Celebrate Musicals Week: My Top 10 Songs From Miss Saigon

Miss Saigon is full of wonderful music and moving lyrics, but on today's post I will share my absolute favourite songs and try to explain why I like them so much. I didn't put them in order of preference because it would be impossible for me to rank them – they are listed in the order where they appear in the show. Please remember what I said about the questionable language in the Miss Saigon lyrics!

The Movie In My Mind
This song takes place near the beginning of the show at the Dreamland club. Gigi, one of the bar girls, starts to sing about her impossible dream of escaping Vietnam and living the American Dream. Kim joins in, making it a wonderful female duet where Gigi's deep, dark voice contrasts with Kim's bright, youthful one. Female duets are much rarer in musical theatre than the traditional male-female ones, and I tend to like them as a rule.



Why God Why?
Chris has just realized he's in love with Kim and boy does he sing a beautiful song about his overpowering feelings! I chose to present a video with Gareth Gates singing, because I did mention how much I would love him to play Chris' part! I think his voice was made to sing this song. Blogger wouldn't let me put the video in like I did with the other songs, but I'll give you a link:

Why God Why? sung by Gareth Gates

This Money Is Yours
Chris asks Kim to tell him more about herself. While it's terrible to hear what happened to Kim's parents, I like this song because Lea Salonga delivers it with such deep emotion and maturity of voice that it's impossible to believe she is just 17 years old here.




Sun and Moon
This is Kim and Chris' first love duet (yes, they have two of those). I love the imagery in the lyrics, how it compares Kim and Chris' unlikely romance to the sun and the moon meeting in the sky.



Dju Vui Vai
I've cried at every real wedding I've attended, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to cry when I get to see this performance on stage. The girls' chorus is like from another world, and the atmosphere of hope and promise really reaches your heart, which is much more important than having an authority figure to make the marriage official.



The Last Night of the World
Chris and Kim sing another duet after their unofficial wedding, and this is my favourite out of the two. The arrangements for the two voices are wonderful and the melody is so memorable it's constantly playing in head.



The Morning of the Dragon
One of the many ensemble numbers in this musical which correspond to the word EPIC. The Viet-Cong takes over in determined song. The harmonica is quite interesting here, but I actually think it sounds good.



You Will Not Touch Him/Thuy's Death/This Is The Hour

These three are always grouped a little differently depending on which album they're in – sometimes This Is The Hour is a separate track, sometimes it's put together with Thuy's Death and isn't mentioned by name at all. Anyway, they happen one right after the other, I think they're all great and clumping them all together means I've got more room in my Top 10 list, so they're going to be one item in this list. The story gets to one of its highest points here when Kim shows that she really will do anything to protect her little boy when Thuy comes back and threatens him. After this comes This Is The Hour, another ensemble number that sends shivers down my spine every time I hear it, and features what I think are honestly the best harmonies in the universe of musical theatre. Yes, I'm really going to make such a huge statement!



Bui-Doi
The ensemble sings again, led by John. John has become such a different person than what he was in Act I – in a positive sense! Once again, I love the melody and the harmonies...



Now That I've Seen Her
This is Ellen's solo which will no longer be heard in the revival. Ellen gets a lot of dirty looks from fans because of how they interpret these lyrics, but like I stated in my earlier post, I can't see what there is to hate about her. She has to go through a lot emotionally, suddenly hearing that her husband basically has another family in Vietnam!


Monday 23 September 2013

Celebrate Musicals Week: Tagged!

Time to start off Miss Dashwood's Celebrate Musicals Week – or, in my case, Miss Saigon Week! I'm really excited about this week, because I obviously love musicals a lot and I got to pick a really great musical to write about. So I would like to thank Miss Dashwood for hosting this blog party, and for providing the tag for this post. I will respect her wish of keeping the content of all my Miss Saigon related posts family-friendly. Please read the following about the content of Miss Saigon before proceeding:

Miss Saigon is by no means a light and fun play, I have to say. For those of you who don't know the plot I'll be giving a short synopsis in a minute, but first let's give the warnings of any content that some readers may find inappropriate. My language, as always in my blog, will be clean and I will not use any swear words or offensive language, but the lyrics and the plot of Miss Saigon include some very unpleasant words and references, including: extremely derogatory references to women, swear words, some negative language about Asians (though it's nowhere near the ugliest I have heard), prostitution, two deaths by gunshot and general things to do with war. I hope I remembered everything noteworthy.





And now let's move on to Miss Dashwood's tag, there are some nice questions to answer!


1.  What musical did you pick to "spotlight" this week and why?


I chose Miss Saigon by Boublil and Schönberg because I fell in love with most of its songs the minute I heard them (they are just as brilliantly composed as the score of Les Misérables!) and the story is extremely beautiful and tragic. I also liked the idea of spotlighting a musical that is currently under much discussion because Miss Saigon is returning to the West End and it's been very exciting hearing all the news regarding the new production!


Just in case there are readers who don't know the story of Miss Saigon, here's a short plot synopsis: Chris is an American GI who fights in the Vietnam War, and Kim is a young Vietnamese woman whose family was killed in an attack. The two meet at a night club where Kim works as a bar girl and a prostitute. The owner of the night club is the Engineer, a slimy character who only wants to get an American visa so he can move there and live "the American Dream". Chris and Kim instantly fall in love and Chris promises to take her with him to America, but then the Fall of Saigon happens. The Viet-Cong invade Saigon and all the American soldiers, including Chris, are evacuated while Kim is left behind.


Three years later, Kim is raising her and Chris' son Tam, while Chris has got married in America in an effort to get over his grief. The Engineer thinks up a plan to get into America – he thinks he will get the visa if he pretends to be the uncle of Kim's half-American child. Kim, Tam and the Engineer travel to Bangkok, where Chris also arrives with his wife Ellen after receiving news that Kim is alive and has had his son. Kim wants to send Tam to America with his father, but Chris and especially Ellen think it's a better idea if they support Kim and Tam financially in Bangkok. Kim is so desperate for her son to have a better life in America that she shoots herself. 


2.  How did you discover the musical you picked (hereinafter referred to as "your musical")?


I first got obsessed with Les Misérables and then found out that Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg had made other musicals too. I found the Original London Cast recording and fell in love.


3.  If you had to pick three favorite songs from your musical, which ones would they be?


Oh dear, only three songs from a score where at least every other song is my favourite? Okay, I'll try...



  • The Last Night of the World, a beautiful love duet by Kim and Chris
  • This Is The Hour, a stunning ensemble number, the harmonies give me chills every time
  • The Movie In My Mind, a duet by Kim and Gigi, another bar girl
I'll be discussing more of my favourite songs somewhere during the week...


4.  What's your least favorite song from your musical?


I don't think any of the songs are bad, but the one I definitely like the least is The American Dream, sung by the Engineer near the end of the show. He sings about how he's going to make a fortune in America, which he basically said already somewhere earlier. The way he talks about his mother and father's professions is really quite disgusting and the composition isn't as memorable as in the other songs. 

5.  Who are your favorite characters (choose up to three)?

Kim, because she is such a well-developed character and has so many great songs. It's probably one of the hardest musical roles to cast – the original London production's auditions went on for a long time before Lea Salonga was found, and even now they're still looking for a Kim for the London revival.


Gigi, because she's an interesting character too even though she doesn't have much stage time. First she appears to be completely hardened by life, teasing Kim with the other girls. Then she starts singing The Movie In My Mind and reveals the hope she still has in her heart even though she knows it's foolish.


Ellen, because she is in such a difficult position regarding Chris and Kim. It would be easy to hate her for "taking Chris away" from Kim, but I can't because Ellen suffers from the situation too. I think her solo Now That I've Seen Her is great. It has been replaced by a new song Maybe, and I can't wait to see if I can like that song too.

6.  Which versions of your musical have you seen/listened to, and which is your favorite?

Unfortunately I haven't seen Miss Saigon on stage at all yet. There was a production in Finland in 2004, but I wasn't such a musical freak back then so I didn't know anything about it. Only two cast recordings exist: the Original London Cast recording and the Complete Symphonic Recording. I like the first one better, because Lea Salonga and Simon Bowman are so amazing as Kim and Chris.


7.   Is this your favorite musical of all time?  If not, what is?


It's definitely in my Top Ten list, but not the ultimate favourite. That is... Les Misérables!


8.   Which cast album/musical soundtrack in your collection do you listen to the most?


I haven't really kept track of that... Lately, I've been listening to the Miss Saigon OLC a lot to get inspired for this blog party. The Les Mis 25th Anniversary Tour recording is definitely one of my favourite cast recordings which I listen to a lot. 

9.   What is your favorite costume from your musical?

Actually, Miss Saigon isn't filled with lovely costumes like The Phantom of the Opera, My Fair Lady and such. Most of the men wear army uniforms and most of the women wear, well, skimpy clothes. Kim wears something tattered and unattrctive most of the time. However, there is one scene where she gets to dress up nicely – the wedding scene. I couldn't find a better picture of it, but here you can see Kim, kneeling in that white dress:






10.  If you could change anything about your musical, what would you change?

I would want to make it clearer that Chris was just as devastated about being parted from his beloved as Kim was, and that he only married Ellen after losing all hope of being reunited with Kim. Chris gets a lot of hate from fans because people think he married Ellen without looking back and forgot all about Kim. I think it would be good for him to have a proper solo in the second act, either right after he finds out he has a son, or when he has arrived in Bangkok. He could sing about what his life was like after he left Kim behind, and what led to his marriage with Ellen. 


11.  Which role(s) would you most like to play in any musical, if you had the opportunity to do so on stage?


I think Éponine is my number one dream role in a musical! She has great songs and gets to die on stage after singing a touching duet with Marius, and then gets carried off by singing young men. Not bad at all! And I really like that hat she wears.


Another great role to play would be Eliza Doolittle. She's such a funny character, and quite demanding too as you'd have to portray both the Cockney-speaking flower seller and the "fair lady" she becomes. I love all the four solo songs she has!


I've been planning a separate "My Dream Roles In Musicals" post so I won't go on about this forever, but other great roles to play would be Maureen Johnson in RENT, Nancy in Oliver! and Ilse in Spring Awakening. Just to name a few...


12.  If you could choose one performer to play any part in your musical, who would you choose and which part would you have them play?


I really have just one wish about the upcoming West End revival: Please, please, please have Gareth Gates play Chris! I absolutely adored his voice as Marius on the Les Mis 25th Anniversary Tour recording, and I think he could express Chris perfectly! He's even sung Chris' solo Why God Why!





13.  Do you consider yourself a musical theatre fan in general or do you just like a few musicals?


Musical theatre as a form of art is pure awesomeness! Alright there's bound to be some musicals that I don't like that much, but not very many!


14.  Are you tired of the word "musical" yet?


No I'm not, and I never will be!


15.  Turn your music playing device on shuffle (or utilize Pandora if you don't have one) and tell us the names of the first three show tunes that come up-- no cheating!  How do these rank on your favorites/most-listened-to list?

  • The Bitch Of Living from Spring Awakening – I listen to Spring Awakening from time to time. It's not one of my absolute favourite musicals but there are some things I really like about it. This song is angsty in a really funny kind of way... Or maybe it's just my weird sense of humour.
  • Any Dream Will Do from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat – It's an OK song, nice and mellow. Again, this isn't on my favourite musicals list, I think it's weird though kind of fun too.
  • Sympathy, Tenderness from Jekyll & Hyde – I discovered this musical quite recently, haven't listened to the cast recording enough yet to really give my proper opinion about the songs. This one does have an interesting, eerie atmosphere.


So the blog party has begun... Have a great week with musicals everyone!




A Tolkien Blog Party of Special Magnificence

So it's not just a Celebrate Musicals Week now – it's also a Tolkien Blog Party Week, hosted at The Edge of the Precipice! It's going to be a busy week with both of these parties going on, but it's sure to be a lot of fun too. And I was quite embarrassed to notice that the 22nd was in fact a Sunday, not a Monday like I thought, so that's why I'm late for this. So typical of me. But let's get on with the Tolkien celebration now and answer these questions by Hamlette! Late happy birthday to Bilbo and Frodo!





1.  Have you read The Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit? If so, how many times?

Of course, both! How many times, though? I remember reading The Lord of the Rings three times in Finnish before I switched into the English version, and in the last couple of years I've had the habit of reading it every summer. The same goes with The Hobbit. 

2.  Have you seen any movies based on them?

I've seen all the Jackson movies made so far (including the first part of The Hobbit) and even the Ralph Bakshi animated version which was a rather interesting experience.
3.  Who first introduced you to Middle Earth?

Nobody really – I just got interested in the books after hearing everyone talk about them, and the Jackson movies (all three of which had come out by then but which I hadn't seen).


4.  Who are your three favorite characters?  (Feel free to elaborate on whys.)

Bilbo is my absolute favourite of them all. Do I really have to tell you why he's so awesome? I just relate so much to his desire to see the wider world, and how he just doesn't care that everyone in Hobbiton thinks he's nuts!

Aragorn has got to be the second favourite. His first appearance is one of my most-anticipated moments in the book as well as the film Fellowship of the Ring.

I like Éowyn in the books, especially after the battle of Minas Tirith, but not in the movies unfortunately – Miranda Otto's Éowyn cries too much!


5.  What's your favorite Middle Earth location?

King Thranduil's court in Mirkwood.


6.  If you could belong to one of the races of Free Folk (Men, Elves, Dwarves, Hobbits, Ents), which would you choose?

This is going to be such a predictable answer but I'd pick Elves. They speak beautiful languages and I like all their locations, such as Rivendell and Mirkwood. They ride their horses bareback which I like to do as well.


7.  Would you rather eat lembas or taters?

I'm not big on eating bread but lembas isn't just any bread... So I'd pick that.


8.  If you lived in Middle Earth, what weapon would you prefer wielding?

I think it would be better if I didn't use any weapon at all, I have such a terrible aim! I could borrow the hobbits' idea and use a frying pan.


9.  What draws you to Tolkien's stories?  (The characters, the quests, the themes, the worlds, etc.)

I can read The Lord of the Rings again and again because it's such a huge story that I find something new to think about each time. I just love how detailed and complete Middle-Earth is.


10. List up to five of your favorite lines/quotes from the books or movies.

“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” 

“Do you wish me a good morning, or mean that it is a good morning whether I want it or not; or that you feel good this morning; or that it is a morning to be good on?” 

“It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.” 

“And now leave me in peace for a bit! I don't want to answer a string of questions while I am eating. I want to think!"
"Good Heavens!" said Pippin. "At breakfast?” 

"Nine companions. So be it. You shall be the Fellowship of the Ring."
"Great! Where are we going?"

Tuesday 17 September 2013

A Tale of Two Cities

Charles Dickens usually wrote about his own time period, around the mid-1800s. He diverted from his contemporary setting in just two of his novels: Barnaby Rudge and A Tale of Two Cities. Being such an admirer of the Victorian era, I realized I had barely read any novels that depicted the 1700s. More specifically, A Tale of Two Cities is set during the years preceding and during the French Revolution.

The French Revolution, of course, was a drastic event in world history and affected whole nations, not just France. Dickens writes astonishing descriptions of its effects in Paris as well as the French countryside, but the most profound message of what the Terror really did is told through a small, close-knit group of characters. Lucie Manette is the daughter of a Frenchman who is "recalled to life" after 18 dark years in the Bastille during the Ancien Régime. (I just realized the preceding sentence is rather ambiguous so I'll clarify that it was the father who was in Bastille, not Lucie Manette!) Soon after Dr Manette and his daughter are united (with the aid of Mr Lorry, a bank officer who remains an important character for the rest of the story), two men enter the picture. They are alike in looks and in their love for Lucie, but otherwise they differ greatly. Charles Darnay is a Frenchman of aristocratic birth who leaves his property and his country because he would rather go to exile in England and earn his own living than tax the peasants who are starving under the yoke. Sydney Carton, on the other hand, is an English barrister and habitual drinker who appears to have little respect for other people and absolutely none for himself.

A Tale of Two Cities is the third Dickens novel I've read and in terms of style it is very different than Oliver Twist and Nicholas Nickleby. It contains much, much less humour and practically none of the sharp-witted sarcasm that I came to associate with Charles Dickens. The writer himself called it "the best story I have written", and I can wholeheartedly say it is one of the best stories I have ever read. For those who connect the word "epic" with boulder-sized books such as The Lord of the Rings and Les Misérables, this outwardly little novel of under 500 pages will be a bewildering surprise. Dickens uses absolutely mind-blowing descriptive language to create an almost disturbingly vivid image of a time period which he did not live. The violent mobs in both England and France become an unstoppable sea; the blood spilled at the guillotine becomes the wine that the "sharp female" drinks.

Storming of the Bastille by Jean-Pierre Houël. 

Dickens is often criticized for his one-sided characters and I sometimes agree with this. Even A Tale of Two Cities has its share of rather flat, uninteresting personalities. Charles Darnay is one, Lucie Manette is another. Dickens' main female characters in general tend to infuriate me. Usually they're either old, ugly hags like Mrs Corney in Oliver Twist, or they're like Lucie Manette, who makes me want to scream "Damn you Dickens, not another sweet, kind, innocent, beautiful lady who faints!"

But there is something here to more than make up for Lucie Manette. We get to meet two other women who are among the best female characters in existence, for very different reasons: Miss Pross, Lucie's absolutely devoted companion who at first seems like a comical filler character but turns out to be something much more, and Madame Defarge, the wife of a wine-shop owner who is so ingenious that she manages to register details about a spy right under his nose but, little by little, turns into the personification of the mindless, violent rage behind the Revolution. Not only are these two women absolute treats by themselves, they even get an earth-shaking confrontation scene near the end of the book. This piece of dialogue is absolutely up there in the same rank as Valjean vs. Javert, Macbeth vs. Macduff, and other legendary confrontations. What makes it really intriguing and epic is that Miss Pross and Madame Defarge speak different languages and and neither can understand what the other is saying!

It would be a crime to write this blog post without mentioning Sydney Carton, the man who looks almost exactly like Charles Darnay, but who has at least fifty times more depth. Like Nancy in Oliver Twist, he changes dramatically as a character, which I did think at times happened rather quickly and without much explanation. I really enjoyed reading the careless, cynical Sydney Carton in the beginning of the novel, but also looked forward to getting some explanation how he ended up like that – which I never got. Still, his dialogue with Mr Lorry is one of my favourite parts of the book, and the sacrifice he has to make at the end of the story troubled me even more than Nancy's fate. I have to agree with Indigo Montoya and say that Sydney Carton's thoughts at the end of A Tale of Two Cities are a near-guaranteed tear-jerker – even I cried over that.

Many passages in this book were deeply moving in different ways, and I will share some of my favourite quotes. The first one is the opening lines of the novel.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way—in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

---

 Crush humanity out of shape once more, under similar hammers, and it will twist itself into the same tortured forms. Sow the same seeds of rapacious licence and oppression over again, and it will surely yield the same fruit according to its kind.

---

Liberty, equality, fraternity, or death; - the last, much the easiest to bestow, O Guillotine!

---

Tell the Wind and the Fire where to stop; not me! (by Madame Defarge)

Thursday 12 September 2013

Announcements!! Celebrate Musicals Week & Six Months Anniversary!

Today, I'll go off-topic from what I usually blog about to make some important announcements. Read on so you'll know what will be happening in Music & My Mind!

Item one (à la Julie Andrews' Mary Poppins): I will be participating in the Celebrate Musicals Week blog party, hosted by Miss Dashwood. You can use the link or the blog button in the sidebar to see all the details, but basically it means that from September 23rd to 28th I'll be devoting my blog to one musical, which will be... Miss Saigon! Because it is one of the most beautiful stories ever, has some amazing songs and it's coming back to the West End next year! I can't review a stage version or a movie version because the first I didn't get to see on its first West End run, and the second doesn't exist yet. I haven't quite decided what my Miss Saigon posts will be, but it's safe to say I'll be sharing my favourite songs and some videos, and Ms Lea Salonga simply has to be mentioned where Miss Saigon is concerned.


Item two: The six months anniversary of Music & My Mind is approaching! The fact that the number of page views has increased by a thousand at an astonishing speed has convinced me that some people in the world actually read this blog, so I want to celebrate in a way that you readers can participate! And better yet, you'll be able to help me improve my blog, because I'm going to ask you really nicely to make a review of it. However, you don't have to start worrying about that just now. The six months anniversary takes place on the 15th of October (I'm counting from the day I published my first post, about Nicholas Nickleby) so somewhere about a week in advance, I'll be making another post and giving you some review questions to answer. I hope you'll take the tiny little trouble of completing the review, it would mean really much to me to know how readers feel about Music & My Mind. And remember, even if you've never ever written a comment here before, you are still more than welcome to review!

Bye for now! I'm off to prepare my Miss Saigon posts...

Sunday 8 September 2013

Dear production team of the possible Oliver! film remake

I blogged about the Oliver! musical film of 1968 and made it quite clear that in my opinion, that film leaves much to hope for and I would welcome the remake that Sir Cameron Mackintosh has tentatively promised. Even though I'm just a little Finn with my little opinions, I have put together an open letter to all the people who might someday be involved in the new Oliver! project – in all understanding that none of the "right people" will probably ever read it. Whatever, I'm still going to have fun with this.

Dear production team of the possible Oliver! remake, here are some of my suggestions how you could make it a better film than the 1968 one.

First and foremost, please make the movie in the spirit of a rather dark Dickens classic and not a children's movie. Do not hesitate to show us the dark side of Victorian London and its people. Be as honest with the setting as Dickens was, and managed to raise real awareness of the poor peoples' plight.

Sir Cameron, you have expressed interest in having Stephen Daldry direct the film. I think this is a fantastic idea, because as director of the absolutely brilliant Billy Elliot film, he has shown ability to work with children and handle a story that has a grim setting but where humour is essential too. Both of these abilities, I think, are very good to have in an Oliver! director. It also doesn't hurt Mr Daldry's reputation that he has worked in the world of stage musicals as well.

Please find an Oliver who can sing and is a charismatic enough actor to carry the story. Enough said.

Please give us the real Nancy, who is not a perfect girl, who develops, and who sings her soul out in those songs. I wouldn't mind casting Samantha Barks at all, having heard her great interpretations of Nancy's songs, but if you give the chance to some new, interesting talent I wouldn't mind either. Samantha's career has already taken off the way she deserves.

Please don't turn every scene into a huge, organized, choreographed dance party.

Please let Bill Sikes sing My Name because it's a wonderful song and it's the perfect way to explain what a dark character Bill is. If possible, bring back all the other songs too that were cut in the 1968 film.

Please make sure that the actors who speak in Cockney sound authentic.

Please have the actors sing live like they did in the Les Misérables film. It sounds fantastic and it really gives the actors the chance to pour emotions into the songs in a way that simply isn't possible in a studio. Oliver! too contains songs where the feelings must sound real – As Long As He Needs Me is just one example.

But let the Artful Dodger keep his top hat, because that is adorable.

That's all I ask of you.

Sincerely,

Mizzie-Me


Friday 6 September 2013

London Culture Explosion!

Last week was was possibly the most wonderful week of my life, and the reason for that was spending four days in my favourite city: London! Em and I had started planning this visit months ago, booking tickets for Ryanair and Les Misérables at Queen's Theatre. I can't possibly describe how over the moon we were at the prospect of not only seeing our favourite musical on stage for the first time, but also of seeing our first West End show. The excitement threatened to turn into stress and anxiety as I waited, waited and never received the confirmation email that I was supposed to get and print out to show at the Queen's Theatre box office. However, as you'll read in my travel diary that follows, everything turned out spectacularly fine.

Monday

The Tampere-Pirkkala airport is one of the dingiest, most depressing buildings in the Universe, but being stuck there for a couple of hours was completely worth it considering where we were going. To make our destination even more exciting, Em got a phone call from our hotel before we boarded the plane. We were told that the room we had booked had become somehow unavailable, but in recompense they had arranged us a room in another hotel just around the corner, and we would get the hotel breakfast free of charge.

It didn't take us long to turn into "lost little tourists asking questions" once we arrived at Stansted Airport.  We had a very amusing conversation with the ticket booth man who patiently explained to us that the Stansted Express would take us to Liverpool Street and yes, that was indeed in London.

By the time we were transported to our newly-arranged hotel room, Em and I were already completely in awe about how nice and polite all the people in this country seemed to be. From now on, I will call Finland Grumpyville in my mind. We were a little travel-worn from the plane and the train, but nevertheless we couldn't bear to stay shut up in that beautiful hotel room, when the city was calling us out! Not that we got too wild on our first night. It consisted mainly of wandering around Piccadilly Circus, admiring how pretty the city looked in the dark, and ogling at theatres and their advertisements. We went to admire Queen's Theatre in advance and also Her Majesty's Theatre, which of course is the home of The Phantom of the Opera. 



Something surprising happened too, something which I'm immensely glad about in retrospect. After seeing dozens of those "half price theatre tickets" booths along the streets, Em had the unstoppable urge to make her way into one of them and ask if they had tickets for The Phantom of the Opera this week. The answer was: "Would you like to go tomorrow?" Can you guess what we responded to that?



Tuesday

The first thing I did on Tuesday morning was find out what the situation was with our Les Mis tickets because we were genuinely scared that we wouldn't be let into the theatre at all on Thursday. In the end I only had to make two more phone calls and as both of the personnel I spoke with were extremely helpful and efficient, I had the much-needed ticket confirmation number in no time. We may have had a little hype attack with Em after the ticket business was officially settled.

Now we were completely free to enjoy a shopping spree to London's most celebrated shopping area, Oxford Street. Em found herself a very nice dress to wear to the theatre, but as neither of us are big fans of shopping in the traditional sense, our morning of shopping turned out to be a little tour around the different Waterstones bookshops. I have to admit that going to Waterstones was, right after seeing Les Mis, the thing I had been looking forward to most! We first went to Oxford Street Waterstones, where I made a rather surprising find: there, in the small selection of DVDs, Liza Minnelli was staring right at me from the cover of Cabaret! I couldn't possibly leave her there. Next up was the Waterstones at Piccadilly Circus aka "Book Heaven". It has five floors!! And in one of those five floors there was an entire shelf dedicated to Shakespeare, and I found this:


I haven't had the chance to properly read this book yet, but according to the back cover and the table of contents, it contains articles about challenges in staging Shakespeare plays, such as costumes, props and stage fighting. Just you wait, Royal Shakespeare Company, I'll be joining your ranks in a couple of years...

Between the Waterstones visits, we managed to find a gigantic CD/DVD store (everything in London seems to be at least six times bigger than in Grumpyville) where we went absolutely hyper when a salesperson told us they had a whole shelf for musicals. So there we went, and met the glorious sight of stacks of movie musical DVDs which we would never, ever find in our dear country. Anttila Megastore should be ashamed. I managed to control myself enough to settle to buying just four new movies.

Shopping haul from the morning's excursion:

  • Book: Shakespeare & The Making Of Theatre, edited by Stuart Hampton-Reeves and Bridget Escolme
  • Movie: Cabaret
  • Movie: The King and I
  • Movie: Hairspray
  • Movie: RENT
Once Em and I were satisfied with our shopping, we returned to the hotel to get ready for the evening's ex tempore programme: The Phantom of the Opera! We were slowly starting to realize that we were in fact going to see the show that we had been drooling about for such a long time. We absolutely didn't want to be late at Her Majesty's Theatre, so we gave ourselves plenty of time to get pretty and find our way there, because with two people with almost no sense of orientation on the move, we had to give ourselves time to get lost on the way to the theatre. We didn't get lost, but somehow the hotel's elevator managed to get stuck while we were in it! Was the Phantom stalking us even before we entered his theatre? However, we got out safely and arrived at Her Majesty's Theatre an hour before the show started, which meant there was loads of time to take pictures of the posters outside and do some Phantom gift shopping. I have a thing for bracelets with things dangling from them, so I had to buy the Phantom-themed bracelet they had there (and then find a way to shorten it because apparently they manufacture those things to people with huge wrists). I also bought the programme leaflet with lots of gorgeous pictures in it.




Unfortunately I won't say anything about the performance itself here... because I'll be making separate blog posts for each of the plays we saw in London! That is the only way to do them justice, don't you think? All I will say now is, I will never stop thanking Em for bursting into that half-price ticket booth.

Wednesday

The sun was shining brightly from a dazzlingly blue sky – what a perfect day to go walking along the Thames! Our plan today was to cross south of the river via London Bridge, see if we'd be lucky enough to get return tickets for the matinee performance of Macbeth at Shakespeare's Globe, and then cross the river again to visit St Paul's Cathedral.

We took the underground to the Monument and finally found out what that immensely tall construction was. There was a wonderful surprise in the train as well: three guys scrambled in with their instruments and played Irish jigs!



The entrance to London Bridge is practically next to the Monument, but somehow we managed to make some strange detour before we eventually found ourselves on the Bridge. Walking across the Thames was awesome, especially as we had an excellent view of the famous Tower Bridge as well. Actually, my whole infatuation with London began when I saw a picture of Tower Bridge in a book – why it was a picture of a bridge that had such an impact, don't ask.


Once we were on the south side of the bridge, we began the search for a site that I particularly wanted to see as a musical fan: Nancy's Steps, where Nancy dies in the musical Oliver!. It turned out to be very well hidden for a famous site! We had to ask directions from two people before we found the Steps, where the plaque bearing their name and history had somehow been taken away!

Picture taken by Em
While making our way towards Shakespeare's Globe, we stumbled upon Southwark Cathedral. As we had still hours to pass before the Macbeth return tickets would be sold and Em is a huge cathedral junkie, we popped in for a visit. Southwark Cathedral, it turned out, is the oldest cathedral in London, and has a memorial for William Shakespeare – his grave, of course, is situated in Stratford-upon-Avon.


The Thames looked absolutely beautiful in the sunshine, and the temperature must have been even higher than the 24℃ that the weather forecast promised. So it was really quite comfortable camping outside Shakespeare's Globe in the return ticket queue. I was once again amazed at how popular this theatre is – I already witnessed it during my previous visit to London, but now I got to see how many desperate people there were besides us as the return ticket queue got longer and longer!

It had been our plan from the start to see Macbeth at Shakespeare's Globe, but the tickets were sold out at lightning speed, which left us the option to trust our luck with possible return tickets. I don't know if those people at the end of that huge queue got tickets, but Em and I did! They were much pricier than the standing tickets of ₤5 that we would have wanted, but it didn't matter at all in the end, because we got the best possible seats: in the lower gallery, almost exactly in the center, with a completely unblocked view to the stage! There aren't many seats like that in the Globe. Because it is built exactly like it would have been in Shakespeare's days, from most seats the view is obstructed by pillars. However, this is the spectacular view from our seats (I took the picture before the play started, because taking pictures during performances is of course forbidden)


The sun kept shining, which was nice because the Globe is an open-air theatre so if it rains, the people with yard tickets get wet. However, I did feel sorry for the poor actors (among them Billy Boyd as Banquo!) who had to perform in the sweltering heat with those heavy Renaissance costumes on. Once again there will be a separate post for Macbeth where I will tell you more about it.

I bought this poster from the Globe giftshop:



Our plan to visit St Paul's didn't work out because it closed at 4 p.m. so that would have to wait till the next day.

Thursday

We left our hotel room later than usual today, because we were going to give up the room so we had to pack and make sure we didn't leave anything lying around. However, we still had one whole day to spend in London. We were going to visit St Paul's Cathedral again (properly) and take a look at the British Museum before the long-awaited Les Misérables in the evening. While we were able to leave our big suitcases at the hotel for the day, we had to take our theatre dresses and everything else we needed for the theatre night (shoes, jewellery, hairspray...) with us on the road.

We went to St Paul's with much better success today. We got inside and saw the famous cathedral in all its magnificence. Every time I see such a massive church, I can't help but marvel how those buildings were put together with none of the technology we have nowadays, and how many decades and how much supplies of all kinds the process must have taken. St Paul's, however, does use modern technology: all of a sudden, there was a voice coming through a loudspeaker, inviting everyone to join in the Lord's Prayer! If I was a practicing Christian, I wouldn't necessarily choose St Paul's Cathedral for my prayers – so many tourists in there, must be impossible to get into a peaceful state of mind. St Paul's has attractions both high and low. We visited both the Whispering Gallery high up in the dome – a climb of 232 steps – and the crypt down below, where the air was so bad I got a terrible headache.

Police horses!

Unfortunately Em and I weren't as lucky with the British Museum as we had been with all other things so far. Everyone goes to the British Museum to see the Egyptian mummies, but we weren't really interested in those. We wanted to explore the rooms of European history, especially the Renaissance and Victorian eras, but those very rooms happened to be closed that day. Well, at least we found fabulous glitter masks from the gift shop, so we can now pay homage to the Masquerade number in The Phantom of the Opera.



After a tasty Italian dinner, we had to find a place to change into our theatre clothes. We ended up invading a Pizza Hut ladies' room, where we might have got a couple of funny looks from people as we liberally sprayed perfume and hairspray all around. We had a nice extra addition to our outfits tonight: Em had sewn us tricolor sashes in honour of Les Amis de l'ABC.  The nice guy at the Queen's Theatre box office didn't even have to ask me which tickets we were collecting. He, the theatre giftshop salesman, and even the man at the cloakroom were very genuine in wishing us a good time at the show, something which a citizen of Grumpyville finds very uplifting. It had been my plan for days to buy this t-shirt from the Les Mis shop:


Once again, my thoughts on our very first, long-awaited experience of stage Les Mis will be posted separately.

Friday

There wasn't really anything Culture Explosional about this last day – all we did was transport ourselves with all sorts of vehicles in a dead-tired state.

I think we baffled the hotel personnel just a bit when we returned there to collect our luggage and then asked to use the toilet, going in wearing theatre dresses and getting out wearing jeans and Cosette shirts. Then it was time to say goodbye to that beautiful, comfortable hotel and journey into the night.

We took the underground to Piccadilly Circus once more, only to find out soon after that that all tube stations would close for a couple of hours, meaning we would have to find another way to get to Liverpool Station. Once more we got advice from a helpful stranger and found a bus to take us there. Another closed gate: the station was also closing for the rest of the night! For the past three days, we had been living like London posh people, going to the theatre every night – tonight, we tried out the life of London hobos, camping outside the station gates and devouring McDonald's nourishment. The man who finally opened the gates at 3.40 in the morning was such a welcome sight.

The Stansted Express took us smoothly to Stansted Airport, where we miraculously ended up at the right gate despite our sleep-deprived states and were extremely depressed to hear Finnish being spoken around us once again.

Thursday 5 September 2013

Jemmthree – tune in for show tunes

I had been wondering for some time whether there existed a radio channel devoted to musicals, a channel which could be listened to in Finland too. I stumbled upon it the day before yesterday: Jemmthree, "the home of stage and screen".

Jemmthree offers an endless stream of great show tunes and songs from movies, with occasional snippets from its presenters. The most entertaining presenter, in my opinion, is Robin Crawley who hosts their Breakfast Show. Showtunes Afternoon with Stephen Beeny, on the other hand, is wonderfully informative about the world of musical theatre. Today, for example, I found out that they still haven't cast the roles of Kim and the Engineer for the London revival of Miss Saigon even though massive auditions were held in Britain, and that Michelle Williams is going to play Sally Bowles in the Broadway revival of Cabaret. 

I have been listening to this channel online for two days now and already I have been treated to practically all of my favourite musicals: The Sound of Music, The Phantom of the Opera, Les Misérables, Oliver! and RENT, to name a few. I have had a couple of wonderful coincidences with Jemmthree as well: they played We Kiss In A Shadow right after I had finished watching The King and I, and As Long As He Needs Me while I was writing about Nancy's Steps to my upcoming blog post about a trip to London I made last week.

So if you want to listen to great songs from stage and screen, go to Jemmthree!