Acorn Antiques: The Musical

What could I say to anyone who says they were disappointed by "Acorn Antiques: The Musical", I would say take some time out of your day and give it another go. Celia Imrie delightfully shocked us with her quite charming singing voice, and Duncan Preston always gives a superb performance with his dry wit and sense of humour with hilarious lines such as "I'll settle this, I have a scrotum" And ofcorse it would be a crime not to mention the national treasure that is Julie Walters, Julie never fails to deliver a top notch performance as her signature role Mrs Bodecia Overall. Neil Morrisey also gives an hilarious performance as "Tony, the Credit Crony" Great Jokes, Perfect Timing, Fabulous,famous Victoria Wood writing style and Funny Catchy show tunes, what more do you need????

If you don't get regional British humour you won't get this - which is a tragedy because this is British theatre at its' best! The dialogue is wonderful, smooth and expertly delivered - as are all the songs and dances. Julie Walters, Celia Imrie, Duncan Preston, Sally Ann Triplett and Josie Lawrence show what true professionalism is and whilst the story is somewhat different to the TV series and lacks some of the familiar items, the new mixture of the TV series and 'Vaudeville/Music Hall' is inspirational, extremely funny and well delivered. Even though I dislike Neil Morrisey's previous work, I have to say he delivered the obnoxious/slimy role very well - good casting, The rest of the cast is tip top too - just like 'Tip Top Tap'!! Well done Victoria Wood et al - more please!!

Acorn Antiques became an iconic part of British comedy history when it debuted as part of Victoria Wood's 'As seen on TV' show.

This musical version came along in 2006, and was a lukewarm critical hit, but again was loved by the public. And really that was who Victoria Wood wrote for.

I didn't like the first half. I thought it was all a bit self-indulgent and wasn't the Acorn Antiques show we hoped to see.

The second half was much better, and much more in the style of the original sketches.

Your enjoyment of this musical will really depend on whether you can sit through the first half.

My best advice with Acorn Antiques the musical is to skip ahead to the second half of the musical (e.g chapter 7 onwards). This is because the first half is ....well....extremely extremely odd. The second half however is the musical you are expecting and you will not be disappointed - great songs and in-jokes.

I hear as the show travelled they did indeed cut out a lot of the first half and God only knows why it made it onto the DVD.

The songs in the second half are superb and you will find yourself singing them for days afterwards. There are also a lot of laugh out loud moments and in-jokes for fans of the original series.

When this was on in the West End I was desperate to get tickets but never managed to. Thank goodness, what a waste of £ 65 that would have been. I'm still angry at paying £15 for the DVD, having not seen it before I bought it ( something I rarely do but felt I could not go wrong with this?) I have always been a fan of Victoria Wood,right from the beginning and acorn antiques was always my favourite sequence from her TV show so was intrigued and excited to see how she would translate a 5 minute sketch into a musical. I cannot fault the acting, although Neil Morrisey gets very annoying after a while - Julie Walters is fabulous as ever and Celia Imrie is wonderful but the problem is it just isn't that funny.Wood seems to think mentioning heamorriods all the time will get the laughs but it just got boring.There is one wonderful song a dance scene the tip top tap ( or something like that!)but the rest of the songs are dull and go on too long. And that is the major problem, the whole thing just goes on, and on ,and on. Wood should have just left Acorn Antiques for us to remember warmly in the 80s instead of making a total hash of a musical.Also on 'bingo nights' when Walters wasn't performing as Mrs Overall, we have DVD extras of scenes featuring Wood as Mrs O. This is embarrassing to the point I had to turn off. There is only one Mrs O !