Me and My Girl

Pearly King and Queen

Me and My Girl

The story of Bill Snibson; a cockney costermonger who inherits the lands and title of Lord Hareford.

This light hearted musical has some lovely characterisation and allows for all generations to take part, from the young friends of Bill and Sally to the older generation of the Duchess of Dene and the ancestors of the Harefords.

There are cameo parts for a pearly king and queen (who play the spoons!) and several smaller parts that can steal the show at points (eg.; Sir Jasper, Lord and Lady Battersby) as well as a broad spectrum of main parts, and plenty of chorus.

Famous songs include The Lambeth Walk, Me and My Girl,  The Sun Has Got His Hat On and Leaning on a Lampost.

Annie Get Your Gun

The story of Frank Butler and Annie Oakley, how they met and joined Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. This musical features the songs “There's No Business Like Show Business”, “ Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better” and “ You Can't Get A Man With A Gun” among others.

The Wild West Show gives opportunities for demonstrations of sharp shooting, rodeo lassoing and ropework, and knife throwing. Whatever skills your cast can muster can become part of the “Show Business” juggling, balancing, dancing girls; the Wild West Show made the most of all kinds of spectacle, almost like a circus with added gunfire.

Set in the latter part of the 19th Century the costumes range from the backwoods of the American West to the European court balls when Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show goes on tour and Annie Oakley is feted by the aristocracy of Europe.

Oklahoma - (4) Gifts

Finale. Gift ideas for Oklahoma!

Lots of ideas for this show;

Cowboys : toy guns, rope lariats, western shoelace ties with decorative fasteners, cowboy hats, boots etc.,

from The Drama Queen's Drawers you can get pin badges and keyrings in the shape of guns and boots, along with more ideas in our Oklahoma!Category.

Keyring

Pistol Pin Badge

For the ladies; gift baskets (related to the Box Social) and anything that might have gone into them, such as gooseberry pies, sweet potato pie, or plain old American Apple Pie. Straw hats and bonnets, tarot cards, smelling salts (or perfume), gingham ribbons or lavender sachets.

For Laurey and Curly ; wedding charms, love tokens, corn dolly.

For Jud ; “French” postcards, a toy kaleidoscope, or perhaps a coffin shaped keyring (Pore Jud is Dead)

Will Parker ; Sweet kisses ( or jelly lips), fifty dollars (monopoly money perhaps), rope lariat, toy cow or bull.

Ado Annie ; toy cat ( persian?) lip gloss (cherry or berry) sweet kisses, 

These are just a few ideas for you. Please visit our website to find all kinds of gifts for those who tread the boards, or help behind the scenes. 

Oliver! - (2)

Our first introduction to the characters of this show is to that of Mr Bumble the beadle and Widow Corney, the workhouse mistress. Oliver is introduced through their perspective when he stands out from the crowd of boys by asking for more food. The wordy and fast “Oliver!” spells out the conditions under which the boys live, and the joy with which the power over them is wielded. Mr Bumble is definitely what today would be known as a “Jobsworth”, and Widow Corney is out for all she can get...including Mr Bumble.
Oliver isn't really established as a character until he has been introduced to the Sowerberrys, whose grim humour and cynicism is portrayed in “That's Your Funeral”.
Only once he is left alone in the funeral parlour does he start to show who he is with the solo song “Where is Love” and our sympathies are with him when he meets and is bullied by Noah Claypole. No wonder he cracks and runs away to seek his fortune in the big city of London. The place where runaways still believe their fortunes are waiting to be made, even if the streets are not exactly paved with gold.

The Artful Dodger and Fagin show us their fun side and we, like Oliver, are deceived into thinking these two are nice generous characters, who only want to help a poor little lost boy....the dark underbelly of the story is only hinted at briefly. We want to believe that Oliver is rescued from the workhouse, and the cruelty of the slavery there and at the funeral parlour, is a worse fate than that of Fagin's gang. So for the audience this is a fun, amusing and optimistic view of Dickens story.  Bill Sykes is the villain, the out-and-out baddie that heroic stories require, but Dodger and Fagin are ambivalent opportunists, rascals rather than mean and nasty criminals, caught up in the trap that poverty has set for them.

Bill Sykes doesn't appear in the stage musical until Act  2  when we are introduced to him with the spine-chilling song “ My Name” which does not feature in the film version. For me this song epitomised the character; as a chorus member in the pub singing along with gusto to “Oom-Pah-Pah” with Nancy, the change in atmosphere wrought by the music and Bill's appearance at the door to the pub always managed to make me shiver, regardless of the fact that the actor playing Bill Sykes was a friend off stage. This alone is enough to make us cheer his demise at the end of Act 2.

For a story about criminal gangs, poverty and brutality, this has become an extremely popular uplifting musical, enjoyed by many audiences, both young and old. When the innocent survive and the evil-doers get their just desserts, the fairytale of “happy ever after” is allowed to continue.

Anything Goes

Probably the most famous and long-lasting of Cole Porter's musicals Anything Goes was first staged in 1934 as a contemporary piece of theatre. Set on a cruise liner with very little in the way of set changes, it is a fun story with lots of well-known and popular songs including “I Get a Kick Out of You”, “You're the Top” and “Anything Goes”. Less well-known maybe is the evangelical “Blow, Gabriel, Blow” which is a big production number in the second act.
There some decent sized parts as well as the lead, Reno Sweeney, and her love interests,  and plenty of chorus numbers to get your teeth into. Reno also has a backing group of girl singers, her “Angels”.
The original 1934 setting gives scope for some fantastic costumes and a wide variety of dance styles, including some tap dancing if that is a skill available among a company's membership. It can also be updated to different time periods without too much difficulty as the music crosses several decades of the twentieth century without being out of its time.
The version I did was the 1962 revival version which included some songs that have since disappeared from the libretto, such as “Heaven Hop” which for us was a tap routine done in shorts and striped sailor tops (perhaps that was why it was cut from later productions!) with Bonnie leading (even this character has been re-named and re-written for the later versions.)

The Music Man - (4)

Gifts for Music Man:

Any kind of musical notation; such as treble and bass clef or quaver charms, Notebooks, mousemats, ties, socks, with sheet music designs.

Pin badges and charms of instruments, particularly trombones and other brass instruments and piano

American flags (it's Independence Day) and Uncle Sam ephemera.

Books, particularly copies of works by Chaucer, Rabelais or Balzac. And bookmarks.

Pocket watches for the Barbershop quartet. A less expensive option - sweet watches may still be found.

Sweet worms or Cornetto ice cream for Winthrop, depending on the child, and the circumstances. (Some companies will not allow ice cream or drinks in the dressing rooms because of space issues and spillages)

See categories The Music Man and Gifts for Musicians and Singers on www.thedramaqueensdrawers.co.uk


On a personal note; Loughton Operatic Society's production in which I am currently appearing (ooh that sounds so grand!) had its first night last night.  We thought we had sorted all the problems that had cropped up on tech and dress rehearsals, but the weather had other ideas. We arrived to find the stage and stage-left legs and wings soaking wet, because the rain was coming in through the roof of the building, so congratulations to our crew for managing to dry out the stage in time for curtain up. We are praying for slightly less rain for the rest of the week!
Wishing  “ Break a leg!”  to all my friends for the rest of the run, and that our audiences enjoy it as much as we are. Congratulations everyone on a great show.