Dirty Dancing

I saw my first show today with a friend from LAMDA, Dirty Dancing. The show was directed by James Powel at the Aldwych Theatre with Hannah Vassillo as Baby and Martin Harvey as Johnny Castle. Many of the West End productions offer day of student rate (i.e. extremely discounted tickets) tickets so I was able to purchase mine at 7 pm for the 7:30 show for only £15. The seat was supposed to be limited view, but because England one the world cup and all the country was out celebrating, there were a fair amount of empty seats and we sat in the first row center of the balcony. I love the film Dirty Dancing and was very impressed by the dance numbers in the piece. The set involved a revolving circle stage with was very cool and I thought worked well with the dancing. In addition, the set included a huge digital projection screen which the director incorporated really well. The first act somewhat felt like it was on fast forward, but the major numbers, like "Hungry Eyes" and "The Time of My Life", were great throughout the show. Vassillo's American accent was pretty good, but Harvey's could have used a bit more work. All in all, if you loved the movie, I'd recommend seeing the piece.

On a last note, according to by singing instructor, I'm not tone deaf. I just "have difficultly hearing, identifying and recreating pitch." I have to work on a Lute song (songs from the late 16th and 17th centuries meant to be accompanied by an instrument) for next week.