My Favourite Things: The Rodgers & Hammerstein 80th Anniversary Concert
My Rating 9/10
In Cinemas now limited release
For those audiences who love great music and great talent this limited showing of a concert tribute to mark the 80th anniversary of the Broadway opening of Rodgers and Hammerstein's ground breaking musical Oklahoma is a must see.
Directed by 5 time BAFTA winner Julia Knowles it features a 40 piece orchestra plus many famous musical star performers of stage and screen.
This who's who of talent features Broadway stars Patrick Wilson , Audra McDonald ,
Aaron Tveit with a delightful appearance from Rita Moreno. The West End stars include Joanna Ampil , Lily Kerhoas ,Maria Friedman and Michael Ball and Marisha Wallace.
This Enchanted Evening took place on Tuesday, 12th December, 2023, at London's newly restored Theatre Royal Drury Lane where the original Westend productions of Oklahoma , The King and I, South Pacific and Carousel took place.
The glorious songs that feature in all of Rodgers and Hammerstein famous and obscure shows are performed to perfection by the cast in song ,dance and narrative tributes to their creators.
It's an era of musical history collaboration that probably will never be seen again
with the advent of juke box musicals and show songs that are mostly forgotten as audiences leave the theatre.
My highlight was hearing and seeing the great six Tony award winning Audra McDonald again in magnificent voice who opens and closes the show .
As the now proprietor of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber the 2nd EGOT winner in this concert commented in his opinion Some Enchanted Evening is the greatest song ever written.
I don't entirely agree with that however this concert certainly qualified as an Enchanted Evening.
