Fame

‘Fame: the musical’ follows the students in the final class of New York’s famous high school for the performing arts.  The show works its way through complex issues including addiction.  This production was the offering of NODA newcomers, Suzanne Scale Performing Arts Academy.

The curtain opened to reveal a basic but well-constructed set.  It allowed the performers to use different levels in the action.

The opening number: ‘I pray I make PA/Hard work’, was very impressive with the small but well-drilled cast delivering a great start to the show with excellent vocals and sharp dance moves.

Lowri Hulson played Carmen.  She had a nice character and a good voice.  She had the audience singing along with her during the title song!

Lily Hicks did a great job as Schlomo.  She had a lovely nature to her character and great vocals.  She formed a good partnership with Lowri throughout the production.

As Nick, Sol Constantinou did an excellent job.  He had great stage presence and strong vocals in the musical numbers.  This was a well thought out portrayal of the character.  Well done.

Rubie Follon was terrific as Serena, who falls in love with Nick.  As an audience member I really believed her emotions and her singing was simply excellent.  A thoroughly enjoyable performance.

Eve Pearson had a tough job playing Tara, who is usually Tyrone.  She was an excellent dancer and performer.  She had good vocals in the musical numbers and I liked the subtle differences in story allowed because of the name change of character.

Iris, played by Amelia Bergmanski, was another excellent dancer.  Really well done.

Lucy Price was a great comedy performer as Mabel.  I really enjoyed her rendition of ‘Mabel’s Prayer’.

I must congratulate James Robinson on his dual characterisations of Mr Myers and Mr Sheinkopf.  There were two distinct characters, sometimes within seconds of each other and neither one drifted into the other.  Well done.

Roisin Brennan had great energy as Goody.  She was full of energy and life whenever she was on stage.

I really enjoyed Jon Herco-Thomas as Joe, a role I played myself nearly 20 years ago!  He was very funny.  The musical number, ‘I can’t keep it down’, had the audience in stitches.  Very well done.

Daisy Jarvis did a good job as dance teacher, Ms Bell.  She had a very caring nature and a lovely singing voice. 

Lambchops was played by Miri Tyre.  She had a great character and was clearly loving being on stage.  She always had a smile on her face and this was really lovely to see.

Strict teacher, Ms Sherman was played by Alexis Spinola.  She nailed the character and had an excellent singing voice.  Her duet with Daisy was great but I have to say that her version of ‘These are my children’, absolutely brought the house down.  Brilliant job!

From a technical perspective, occasionally the backing tracks were a little loud, meaning it was difficult to hear some of the singing owing to limited microphones.  The overall quality of the singing however, is to be applauded.

It was a pleasure to watch this production.  I am thrilled you’ve chosen to join NODA and I look forward to seeing your other productions in the future.

 

The views in this report are solely of the author.

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