Hairspray – The smash
hit musical arrives
in Milton Keynes this week
An ultimate feel-good
musical that everybody will love! We went to see the show last night at MK
theatre and having not seen the show before or being too aware of the story, I
admit that we were expecting something a tad cheesy. It was totally cheesy - in
a brilliantly fun, colourful, great music, great acting and dancing kind of
way!
The story follows
Tracy Turnblad, an overweight not-so-popular teenager in 1960’s Baltimore.
She’s completely obsessed with the Corny Collins Show and seeks to get a spot
as one of the show’s ‘Miss Hairspray’ girls. In a time where segregation was
the norm between different races and religions, Tracy takes on the media and
the public’s expectations to forefront a campaign for ‘Integration Not
Segregation’. Things needed to change and no more would the black community be
separated from the white community and everybody would be able to dance and
sing together!
Tracy, played by
Rebecca Mendoza, is a very likable character and Rebecca’s performance was
outstanding. This was her professional debut and I thought she was fantastic.
The same goes for the entire cast, ensemble and musicians. There were some very
melodic and powerful voices among them and Brenda Edward’s (Motormouth
Maybelle) solo was particularly spine-tingling. An excellent performance and
break dancing routines from Layton Williams as well – we interviewed him for
April’s magazine so it’s always great to check out their performance on the
night.
The stage set was
quite simple with a few backdrop changes and some props and costume changes,
but with all the bright colours and terrific dance routines and hair bigger
than you can imagine, it all worked really well. We left humming the tune to
You Can’t Stop The Beat and proceeded to talk about the show all the way home.
