Shrek The Musical Jnr

The Young Performers took us to the swamp and beyond with their production of Shrek the Musical Jr.

The first thing to mention is the amazing backstage team. Huge praise must go to Roydon Charlesworth for working his magic to create a magnificent set that transformed us into the Swamp, Castle, Duloc, and Dungeon. I particularly loved the dragon and gingerbread puppets which had been handmade by Roydon and looked fabulous. This year the group has launched a fantastic new venture called the ‘Young Techies’. They have recruited an enthusiastic group of young people who help with all the elements of backstage. In this production, they helped on stage crew with the lighting and sound design and implementation. They did a wonderful job, the scene changes took place with pace and precision and the lighting and sound enhanced the performance.

Will Mellor took the lead role of Shrek and mastered the Scottish accent really well which he continued flawlessly throughout the performance. Neve Johnson played a beautiful Princess Fiona with a sassy ogre side. Will and Neve’s timing in the scene “I Think I Got You Beat’ was spot on and had the audience giggling in their seats, great comic timing. The Young Fiona’s Isobel Pickering and Lottie Ellis joined Neve on the balcony to sing a lovely rendition of ‘I Know It’s Today”. Donkey is one of the most iconic characters in Shrek and we were in good hands with Finlay Tomlinson playing this role. Full of all the character's traits and bringing bundles of energy and enthusiasm every time he appeared on stage.

Another confident performance was from Alex Povey as Lord Farquaad with clear diction and moving around on his knees for the entire performance has to be commended. One of the standout performances of the evening was from Lucy Coulson-Jones portraying the Dragon. Lucy handled the Dragon puppet with confidence and sang ‘Forever’ with gusto. I have seen Lucy perform in a number of previous productions and this is by far her best performance to date.

The ensemble looked like they were having a great time portraying the many different Fairy tale characters, Guards, Villagers, Duloc dancers, and Pied Piper dancers. Special mention to Lexi–Mae Hart (Pinocchio) and Violet Graney (Gingy) for two lovely cameo roles. My favourite number was “What’s Up Duloc”, the choreography was clean and excellently executed by all, the costumes were bright and vibrant and this created a fun introduction to the town of Duloc and Lord Farquaad.

Many congratulations to the production team Zak, Ellie, and George, and everyone involved on and off stage. It was wonderful to see the theatre packed with fans of all ages who enjoyed the performance. Thank you all for a lovely evening and I am looking forward to seeing your production of The Little Mermaid in June.

© NODA CIO.  All rights reserved 

© NODA CIO. All rights reserved.