Beauty and the Beast

What a better way to spend a cold miserable night than in a theatre watching a Disney Show with music by Alan Menken, and so it was on this cold November evening I attended the Taliesin theatre to watch the Abbey Players perform Beauty and The Beast. 

The musical is based on the 1991 animated film and the original Broadway version ran for over thirteen years and was nominated for nine Tony Awards.

The musical is well known and I looked forward to seeing what Ashley did with it. Thes set was very minimalistic with platforms either side of the stage fed by steps covered in greenery , and a projection on the rear wall covered scene changes and locations.  The musical includes a number of well known songs and I think the ensemble under the musical directorship of Jonathan Lycett did a very good job with them all.

There is a large cast of characters in this show and I enjoyed all the performances of Cath Bingham, Bethan Packer and Bethan Hubbard as Les Filles, Simon Lloyd - Jones as Le Fou and Max Dennis as Chip.

The roles of Madame Grande La Bouche and Babette were taken by Rhian Hiley and Lizzy Hopkins both of whom gave lovely performances , Lizzy with just the right amount of flirtiness , and Rhian with the typical grandeur of a grand opera singer. I was delighted that Rhian was able to perform having missed the first three shows with illness, for which I am told Leah Collett stood in with hours notice admirably.

Maurice was played by Simon John and there were some lovely moments in his performance especially his interaction with Belle .

The three main servants wanting to change back to human form before the last petal fell from the enchanted rose were played by Joanne Griffiths as Mrs Potts, Ewan Forrest and Cogsworth the clock and Connor Edwards as Lumiere the Candlestick. I really enjoyed all their performances. Joanne gave a lovely rendition of Beauty and the Beast, Ewan was a lovely Butler turned clock with some very funny moments but I think Connor’s performance as Lumiere was definitely the best that I have seen this young man play. I loved his expression and movement on stage, with Be our Guest being one of the highlights of the show with some very clever choreography by Ashley and Tracey.

Gaston was played totally over the top perfectly by Nick Packer, you couldn't help but dislike this character, well done .

Belle was played by Natalie Edwards and I have mentioned in a previous review that she is a typical Disney Princess, this was also the case with this performance as the girl ridiculed for her reading in the village to the way she stood up to the Beast with attitude until finally falling in love with him. Natalie has a lovely singing voice and gave another very good performance.

The Beast was played by Joseph Giblin who gave a powerful performance once again as this fairytale character, Joseph gave a lovely performance and I particularly liked " If I can't love her”.

This show is dependent on colourful characters and lovely movement and I believe Abbey achieved this. special mention at this stage must go to Lee Lloyd -Jones who sourced and made all the costumes, congratulations Lee. There were some lovely dance sequences and all in all it was a very enjoyable evening’s entertainment.

Thank you once again Abbey, for your warm welcome and I look forward to joining you in 2025.

 

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