The Lord of the Rings Retrospective

[ChewingTheScenery]

Hello,

I've written quite a long blog piece looking back at at the Lord of the Rings stage show and asking 'What Went Wrong?' as the first in a new series of articles.

You can find it here; http://bit.ly/NDLcDm

Many thanks,

- Harry Zing

[Princeton Returns]

The best piece of technical theatre I have ever seen. Absolutely loved it. I also thought the score was great on the whole.

[bob8rich]

An amazing spectacle. But I found the book and the score mindnumbingly boring.

[devonian.t]

We'll never see the like again (probably).

I think it fell between 2 stools: it was too long for one evening and too short for two. Personally, I would have expanded it into a Dark Materials type show where you could book part 1 and part 2- that would have given more time to build character and relish the moments. Alternatively, they could have cut out one of the two big battles and made it a more condensed story.

Even so, it was an unparalleled technical achievement and a physical marathon for the cast, that deserves huge admiration.

[bob8rich]

Oh, God, devonian, I could never have stood 2 of them! lol

I guess it's a show for lovers of the books & films. I have never had any interest in reading the books and gave up after 1 hour of the first film as I was ready to climb up the walls with boredom. So I guess the show was never going to be my cup of tea. But it was even worse torture than I expected. Even at half the length it would have been too long for me lol.

I do agree that it was technically superb though.

[DeNada]

Ah, so many moments to savour. Like Gimli singing about mines for no reason other than it was a musical - oh wait, no, it WASN'T a musical, the PR was very keen to tell us that. And Rosalie Craig yodelling about the Star of Earandil. And whatever Saruman's accent was. And the Balrog made of tissue paper. And...

I thought Matthew Warchus was supposed to have learnt from doing LOTR that sometimes less is more. Clearly that lesson didn't apply to Ghost.

Despite the myriad technical joys of LOTR and a particularly impressive performance from Michel Therriault (and the undeniable excellence of Laura Michelle Kelly's ethereal entrance singing Lothlorien), overall there was just too much rammed into the one show and the material was of varying quality. Despite the excellence of some of the individual scenes (the pre-show with the fireflies etc. will stay with me for many years) the whole package was just a bit naff!

[Mister Matt]

I guess it's a show for lovers of the books & films.

I was utterly bored by the books and films and I loved the show! Probably because it condensed all of it down into the least meandering and confusing narrative yet. I loved it BECAUSE it wasn't like the books or films. I was jetlagged as hell and had to be dragged to the show and I was expecting to hate it. Other than the poorly staged and choreographed combat scenes, it just didn't want it to end. Love the score and listen to it often.