Grand Theatre, Leeds – 13 July 2015
Dreamboats and Miniskirts arrives in Leeds this week and its a strange little rarity. Not only is it a musical sequel, to the hugely successful Dreamboats and Petticoats, but its an even rarer thing – in that its even better than the original.
Now set in 1962/63, the story continues the lives of Bobby and Laura, Ray and Donna and Norman and Sue. Plus the lives of the band The Conquests.
Written by Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran – the writers of Birds of a Feather and Goodnight Sweetheart – and produced by Bill Kenwright it has pedigree but the key to its success is the music.
The ensemble cast, with no big stand-out stars, sing, dance and play their musical instruments as the hits keep on coming.
Bobby (Alex Beaumont) and Laura (Elizabeth Carter) have had a No.1 hit with their song, Dreamboats and Petticoats, but now their career is taking a bit of a downward spiral.
Norman (Alastair Hill) and Sue (Laura Darton) are settling into married life, and have a child on the way, and Ray (David Luke) and Donna (Anna Campkin) seem perfectly happy together.
But don’t be put off if you haven’t seen Petticoats. Any information that’s needed is spelled out for you by the characters. The young company (directed so beautifully by Kenwright and Keith Strachan who set all this before us with experienced flair) are consistently marvellous and generate a great sense of sheer well-being. They wear their beehives, Sixties geometric frocks and snake hip slacks with great panache and do their damnedest to give the songs as much welly as is humanly possible, which drew cheers from the audience (Pretty Woman took the roof off)
Enter Record Producer, Tony Lister (Alan Howell) and the push to stardom begins. The show is packed with the biggest songs of the 1960s, but doesn’t seem to have those corny set-ups you sometimes find in shows like this. Each song seemed to fit perfectly in the moment.
Whilst all the cast are outstanding, my eye was caught by the character of Joe played by Will Tierney. Playing his guitar he seemed like a mischievous musical imp, genuinely enjoying himself and brimming with talent. Despite being in the “background” his blatant enjoyment of the role shone in all his scene’s and its little joys like that, that make the show even more successful. Knowing the cast are enjoying themselves always shows in the performances.
But I have two niggles. The first – What happened to Norman and Sue’s baby? What did they have? How much did it weigh? What did they call it? We need to know!
And the second – why did I have to stay seated in my chair? I wanted to be up and dancing in the aisle, and whilst chair dancing is fun, more of the end concert would have been good and then we could all have been up for a sing-a-long and boogie.
This is a 5 star feel-good performance and will appeal to all ages with its high energy and outstanding talent.
In Leeds until Saturday 18 July and on tour around the UK