There’s nothing quite like live theatre.
Hold tight - we’re checking permissions before loading more content
Musicals in particular.
It’s like getting a movie and concert in one.
The actors are extraordinarily multitalented; usually able to sing, dance and dramatise well.
And, they get one take to do it all.
No option to re-shoot a scene, no room to get tongue-tied, miss notes, forget lines, no moment to pause, laugh and recompose after a stuff-up.
I know they happen, but stage stars so masterfully carry on, it’s often seamless and unnoticeable.
No bloopers reel exists.
When I consider all of this, I find it weird that the actors who grace our theatre’s stages aren’t more widely known or more handsomely paid than our Hollywood actors.
I mean, I find it absurd how much Hollywood actors are paid full-stop, but you get the gist of the imbalance I’m pointing to, I’m sure.
The first time I saw Australia’s answer to Broadway at a theatre in Melbourne’s CBD was for The Boy From Oz, a biographical musical about Aussie songwriter and entertainer Peter Allen.
I wound up there unexpectedly in my early 20s.
Mum and Dad had tickets, but Dad was sick on the day, so I filled his seat.
I remember my wide, unblinking eyes darting around the scenes unfolding on stage before me.
It was a sensory overload in all the best ways — the energy, sound, movement, colour, light — there was so much to take in.
The experience cracked open every can in a whole slab of worm cans, and now, more than 20 years later, I can’t even tell you how many stage shows I’ve seen.
The latest ticked off my bucket list of theatre was MJ The Musical, which focuses on the making of Michael Jackson’s ‘Dangerous’ world tour in 1992 and parts of the controversial celebrity’s childhood and upbringing.
The show included 25 of his hit songs, performed by three different artists portraying him at various ages: child, teen and adult.
They were all fantastic, but I’m convinced the lead, the adult version, played by Broadway’s Illario Grant, is a reincarnation of Jackson himself.
His moves, mannerisms, voice, look and energy were spot-on.
I felt like I was at an MJ concert if it were a Danoz Direct ad — “but there’s still more”.
It was a concert, but with all these bonuses chucked in.
I am a bit of a concert fiend, having seen two in the same weekend as the musical.
It highlighted for me that while you often have to wait until the end of a concert to hear (arguably) all the ‘best’ songs, that’s not the case with a musical.
The greatest hits could pop up anywhere in the script, depending on where they best fit in the story.
It’s excitingly unpredictable, and, while I doubt it is the reason, I like to believe it’s why theatre shows feature intermissions and concerts don’t.
Nobody wants to miss their favourite number while in the loo!
While I’ve sung the praises of these long-running, big-billboard city shows, I need to give credit to our local productions and performers.
I go to these shows, too, and I love them just as much.
I’m by no means a theatre buff, a critic, or a nit picker. I just love stuff and am grateful that I get to do stuff because others gave a stuff about creating stuff for others to enjoy.
If I tell you something is bad, it was probably really bad.
But I can’t tell you that about any of Shepparton Theatre Arts Group’s productions.
They are just as good as anything I’ve seen on a Melbourne stage.
Ahead of seeing Little Shop of Horrors last year, I wondered how they might portray the giant man-eating puppet well; how they might stylise Skid Row; whether they would speak in strong New York accents.
They did it all perfectly.
And they did it again this year with Chicago.
Our local performers could easily fit right in up there on stage next to the ones starring in those long-running, big-billboard shows, but I’m – perhaps selfishly – glad they’re not.
Our local set-designers, costume creators, make-up and hair stylists, lighting operators, sound engineers, the whole team, could all be there too.
But lucky for us, they’re here in the Goulburn Valley.
There’s truly nothing quite like live theatre. Local features included.