Annie

Many people will know that Annie has never been one of my favourite shows. However this production has gone a long way to changing my mind as this was by far the best Annie I have ever seen with lots of energy, great casting and wonderful performances and characterisations.

The whole company looked like they were enjoying themselves and that always exudes its way into the audience. The night I was in Caitlin O’Connor played Annie but due to a throat infection, the second half was sung by the other Annie, Phoebe Eade. Well done to both girls and to Caitlin for taking the very adult decision for Phoebe to sing thee second half thereby protecting her voice from any permanent damage.

The sets were nicely built with minimal delay between changes and the props and costumes worked well for each character. The lighting complimented the scenes and although there were a few crackles on sound, overall it all worked well.

The Orchestra sounded great under the baton of John G Barry who is a pleasure to watch as he always has a smile on his face. It is clear he was enjoying himself as much as the cast on stage and you can see they all trust him to bring out the best in them.

The choreography looked very effective in chorus numbers as well as with the orphan numbers and I especially like Easy Street with all 3 performing well.

Annie was beautifully characterised by Caitlin who played well opposite some very experienced actors and Poppy the dog who played Sandy.

All of the orphans were great in their roles with lines delivered clearly and songs sang with great vocals and much enthusiasm. A special mention to Mia Hancox as Molly who had great stage presence and perfect comic delivery.

Oliver Warbucks was well characterised by Philip Brady who had a lovely warmth to his acting and sang his numbers beautifully.

Eileen Wilson put in a lovely performance as Grace Farrell with clear gorgeous vocals and her scenes with Annie were lovely and well directed.

Deborah O’Connor as Lily and Paul McConnochie as President  Roosevelt both put in great performances but the exceptional performances in this production came from Paul Hancox as Rooster and Susan Milligan as Miss Hannigan,

Paul and Susan both have amazing stage presence that when either are on stage you can’t take your eyes off them. Wonderful vocals from both of them on “Easy Street” but I particularly liked “Little Girls” from Susan with its dark undertones and perfect clear diction despite playing drunk. It was the best Miss Hannigan I have ever seen as even when Molly actually got stuck in the basket she kept in character but had obviously worked so much with the girls it didn’t unsettle Mia.

As I said at the beginning this was the best I have ever seen Annie performed and a lot of this is the way it was directed both musically and creatively but also the bond these performers have with each other.  Thank you all so much for a wonderful evening.

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