Thoroughly Modern Millie

This was a good strong production by Red Rose. I believe that there had been a problem with the scenery but the society overcame this setback.

Vanessa Whittle as ‘Millie’ was excellent, she has a natural ability for timing, comedy, and exuberance, she gave a very polished performance and as always her singing was great. The dancing by Mille and her friends ‘The Speed Typists’ was exceptionally good, there were some good ideas and creative choreography here.

David Helm as ‘Jimmy Smith’ who pledges his undying love to Millie, was well suited to this part, and he did a good job with both the humour and sensitive parts of this role. Rachel Mercer was a lovely ‘Dorothy Brown’, what a beautiful singing voice she possesses with good diction, and stage presence.

The White Slaver ‘Mrs Meers’ was villainously portrayed by Karen Fay, and her Chinese accomplices ‘Ching Ho’ Bob Bailey, and ‘Bun Foo’ Billy Barrett were great, their song was hilarious , I hope they were singing what was on the subtitles, my knowledge of the Chinese language is not very good, but it was very well done.

Meryl Bull really was the hostess with the mostest ‘Muzzy Van Hossmere’, it was a shame that her first entrance, instead of the set being the opulent penthouse on Long Island she had to make her entrance in front of a curtain, but she looked fabulous and she really belted out her opening number ‘Only In New York’ and she also was at her best in Act 2 singing ‘Long as I’m here with you’, dressed in disguise as the new orphan in town, really very funny indeed. Geoff Houghton made a convincing ‘Trevor Graydon’ who only has eyes for Dorothy and a nice cameo performance came from Kate Ashton as ‘Miss Flannery’. There were some good supporting roles that were performed very well. The lift scene worked well.

Overall, the cast appeared to be thoroughly enjoying themselves, the costumes were good, as was sound and lighting and the orchestra was very well balanced.

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