By Sophie
Link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/showstopper-the-improvised-musical-livestream-tickets-143134658617?aff=OC (There are two shows on the same page. If you only want to see this one, make sure you don’t rent the 26.2.21 edition by mistake. Both are worth seeing, but renting the wrong show can be one of the most annoying things ever. And I should know.)
Available until: 3rd April
The incredibly-talented Showstoppers return for their second show in two days and it’s definitely one of their best. Two ideas suggested by the audience at the start set the scene for this exciting and emotional musical, full of twists and turns with one or two tantrums as well.
For the first time, the show is accompanied by live captioning. It’s slightly behind the action as you’d expect, but it looks very accurate when I remembered to look at them. I usually need to look at the captions quite a lot as my ears can be irritatingly unreliable, but just one of the things the Showstoppers can do is to produce very good diction. Nevertheless, the captions will be very useful and will enhance enjoyment considerably for those who need them and it’s great to see them in a Showstoppers production. Inclusiveness is always good.
A few people from last night were also involved tonight. Ali James moves from performance into the live chat. Andrew Pugsley leaves his host’s position to join the cast and the indefatigable Pippa Evans shows impressive vocal and imaginative stamina by performing again. She and Andrew are joined by the wonderful Adam Meggido and we get to meet a new Showstopper, Lauren Shearing. Duncan Walsh Atkins and Alex Atty return to the band while Dylan Emery takes over hosting duties. It’s a bit like musical chairs, only with more sanitising.
The styles of the songs are either improvised by the band, with the Showstoppers joining in, or suggested by the audience. Styles used include musicals which first appeared in the West End in 1968, 1983, 2017 and 2019 and a non-musical style from much earlier.
One of the great things about watching a new musical for the first time is wondering what will happen next. That feeling certainly isn’t lessened when the performers are probably wondering exactly the same thing.
The story follows a couple of women, their admirers, their pets and a group of blokes down the pub. There’s a bit of infiltration, a bit of theft and some real naughtiness which Dylan has to put a stop to because it wasn’t PG enough (and that wasn’t even the best part). You also haven’t lived until you’ve seen Andrew take off his glasses. Adam’s rope-climbing, Lauren’s cat-stroking and Pippa’s… mooning are also very memorable.
The show has a brilliantly-creepy opening, started off by Adam and carried on by Andrew. It’s a very amusing start with four of the main characters quickly established. Adam is lucky enough to end up with a normal name, which is far from guaranteed in these productions. Two of the names weren’t even familiar to me (clearly, my collection of name books isn’t big enough after all). Lauren starts off quite quietly before bursting into a very impressively fast piece of improvisation, one of many excellent songs that earn the title of Showstopper.
There are also some very emotional scenes as Pippa makes big life changes, Lauren loses something rather important, and Adam and Andrew share a scene that could have been clichéd but is actually incredibly moving.
Another very impressive performance from the
Showstoppers. (And no, Macavity is no longer my favourite musical cat.)
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