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Daily Update
Posted by Faye Bell on April 27, 2008 at 19:04:17:
A COUPLE OF "TRUE GONE WITH THE WIND" FANS ATTENDED THE GWTW PLAY IN LONDON AND FOLLOWING IS THE SUMMARY OF THE EVENING. SINCE THEY LIVE IN ENGLAND, they couldn't pass up going to see the play, although it cost them over $280.00 for their two tickets.
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As we arrived at the theatre, we were informed that the understudy would be playing Scarlett again. This meant that for 3 out of the 4 performances since opening night, Jill Paice would not be performing.
As we took our seats, we could see the whole of the stage and set design - there was no theatre curtain - and you could not tell that you were about to see GWTW as there were absolutely no references to it at all. The set design was based around a 2 storey building that resembled a beach hut. We discovered that as the play went on, this building became Tara, 12 Oaks, the big house in Atlanta, Belle Watling's saloon and any other building required.
The show started with all the actors walking on to the stage. We recognized Rhett Butler because we knew him from his previous television appearances in England. It was not possible to identify ANY of the other characters - not even Scarlett - from what they were wearing. We only knew who was playing which part when they introduced each other or themselves.
We tried to attend the performance with open minds but these 3 factors set the standard for what was to come for the rest of the evening.
The performance was quite confusing as it was part acted, part sung and part narrated. They followed the story reasonably well but there were some glaring mistakes and the main ones are listed below:
The way Melanie Wilkes was portrayed was even more feisty and angry than Scarlett. Instead of being a Southern lady with a will of iron, she was a screeching harpy.
They used some of the lines from the movie, but in most cases they failed to complete the sentence correctly and in some cases, the wrong character spoke the lines for example: Pork said "It ain't fittin'" and also the words were spoken in the wrong scenes.
The costumes left a lot to be desired. The green drapery dress was very nearly spot on and the dress that Emmy Slattery wore to accompany Jonas Wilkerson to Tara for the $300 was pretty close too. Apart from that, every other character was just wearing period costume. Scarlett wore the same dress in the second half from Gerald O'Hara's death to the end. This was approximately 7 years worth!!!!! Even the barbeque dress was peach silk!!!!!
The song sung in the Casualty List scene was very moving but the rest were pointless. To give an example of this: During Melanie's death scene, as she took her last breath, she launched into a song and then died - in more ways than one!!!!
It seemed that the songs were put into the show to give the scenery and costume changers time to re-set etc but there were hardly any costume or scenery changes.
On a positive note - despite our misgivings about the casting of Darius Danesh, as he came to prominence through a TV talent show - he gave a reasonable performance/impression of Clark Gable. We felt that he carried the show and without him we would have left during the interval.
Also, considering the limitations of the set, the Burning of Atlanta was done fairly well.
In summary, it felt like we were in a small town community hall where the Director of a local Amateur Dramatics society had put out a casting call and anyone who wanted to be in the play should bring a costume and they would be given a part. If that had been the case, we would have given them a standing ovation because they tried hard and didn't quite make it but gave it their best shot. However, as the production cost in the region of $9 million dollars and was a major professional theatre performance in London's West End, we were very disappointed and would give it 4 out of 10. As there were a lot of empty seats - it doesn't bode well for the future of this production.
In conclusion, during the performance, the words DESPERATE and HOPELESS were spoken or sung a lot of times. We felt that this would have been a more appropriate title.