Castle on a Cloud

Last night was epic.

Watched "Les Miserables" at the Esplanade Theater last night with Jay and Miguel. I was enthralled. It's been awhile since I managed to watch a musical/play. Being all over the place really makes it hard to plan ahead, but I told myself I shouldn't miss watching Les Miserables.

I have been listening to songs from Les Miserables since I was in high school. I even learned to play some of them on the piano. I never bothered though to read up on the story since I wanted to be surprised. I'm happy I did that because I got hooked as the story of prisoner 24601 unfolded. It was the story of redemption. Transforming from believing that he was bad to becoming the best person he could be. I shed some tears throughout the show. I won't give any spoilers here, let me just say that I was surprised some important characters died!

The performers were also all very skilled especially Simon Gleeson who played Jean Valjean. His performance was so heartfelt and fresh. His emotions reverberated in the whole theater and I'm really amazed with his voice. I was hoping though to see a Filipino actor in the cast, but they were not on the Singapore cast. I'm not sure if it was Esang who played the young Cosette last night. I had seen her perform on The Voice Kids and she's really good.

Props to the production crew as well for the awesome set and effects they used. Particularly amazing was Javert's farewell scene. Second to that was the scene in the tunnel when Jean Valjean carried Marius back home. I had a glimpse on how things work in theater when I joined an amateur summer workshop way back so I can just imagine all the work they had to do to make things come together that way.

Thank you to the whole cast and crew of Les Miserables. It was a phenomenal night!

I think the theater bug has bitten me again. I read that several more shows are coming to Singapore -- Annie and Wicked! Must save!

Peter Pan at the CCP

I watched Peter Pan last night with Miggy. I wasn't feeling well and was quite skeptical about the show, but I got the tickets and invited friends to watch with me so we still watched.

Blurbs from the flyer claimed "Whatever you remember as a kid - pump it up 10 times!" (South China Morning Post), "Young and old gasped in delight!" (Straits Times)...

After hurried phone calls to my friends who were stuck in traffic at the Mall of Asia, Miggy and I ran to catch the start of the show. The beginning of the show was your usual chorus, intro of characters yada-yada. What was astounding was Peter Pan flying down from the "heavens". Cool, I thought. Miggy was so delighted with all the aerial acrobatics. I was excited about it, but I couldn't help but think how dangerous it was for the kids flying all over the place. What if the line broke? (Knock on wood...).

The last Peter Pan movie I watched were the ones done with Robin Williams (Hook) and the one directed by P.J. Hogan (Peter Pan). I grew up with Peter Pan as one of my bed time stories. The play presented a little bit of a twist to the story. It was a battle of survival where Captain Hook had to be convinced to believe in fairies to save Neverland. The story line was stable, sound, but I think it could've used a bit of fast forwarding. I couldn't also understand some of the words being sung. Some of the performers' voices were hoarse.

What awed me really was the set. If it weren't for the set I would've thought I was watching a high school production, although the aerial acrobatics was fabulous, I think some other Pinoy performers would've done a better job. But since the show delighted Miggy it was worth watching for me.

One sad thing though, my friends didn't make it to the show because of the extraordinary traffic caused by the Pyrotechnics Show at the Mall of Asia. They were stuck there for more than 3 hours! Only about half of the theater was filled, I think the producer should be more considerate in allowing those who didn't make it last night to get their money's worth. It's not as if they were irresponsible in not being able to make it. Traffic was out of control! A lot of those who got tickets for last night did not make it because of the heavy, heavy traffic. I hope the producer gives some consideration for those who missed the show last night.