Press Night: Sweet Charity

the flicker club were thrilled to attend our dear friend Tamzin Outhwaite's press night of the Broadway classic Sweet Charity at the Haymarket Theatre. This production transferred from the beautiful Meiner Chocolate Factory where it played at the end of 2009. We first saw the production there and loved it.

From the moment you hear the bleary, brassy opening notes of the show’s most famous number, Hey Big Spender, you know that you are in for a good time. The band handles Cy Coleman’s outstanding jazzy score with superb panache throughout. Tamzin is adorable and very funny as unlucky dancehall waitress Charity Hope Valentine and is supported by a wonderful cast. The chorus of girls in the Fan-Dango Ballroom are beautifully played, full of weariness, bitterness and savage wisecracks, while Stephen Mear’s inventive choreography is sublime. A special mention too for Mark Umbers, who plays all the men in Charity’s life. 

Tamzin said at the after show party "The nerves were flowing and I think by the time I got to the interval I was feeling very supported, it was a lovely house" and she was right, full of familiar faces and friends, you could feel the love and support flowing, and rightly so, it was utterly deserved.

 © Catherine Ashmore

Juliette for the flicker club

Breakfast at Tiffany's

August 2009

Breakfast at Tiffany’s was such a lovely evening it could have been dinner at the Ritz.

For our second flicker evening we were again joined by Miller’s who set up a lovely marquee and provided our appreciative audience with gin& tonics. Not a bad start to any evening.

The poster for Breakfast at Tiffany’s was designed by Dan Canyon and looked terrific outside the Lexi with magnificently large Audrey Hepburn eyes blazing into the night. Dan also supplied the ingenious flickbook homage to ‘Moon River’, the Henry Mancini ditty that won the 1961 Oscar for best original song.

Next up, our special guest. Last month Miranda Richardson and this month who better than, Sean Mathias.

Sean is a lauded and applauded film and theatre director most recently channeling the combined talents of Sir Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Simon Callow in a magnificent production of ‘Waiting for Godot’ at the West End’s Haymarket Theatre where he is presently Artistic Director. As Sean is in the midst of bringing Breakfast at Tiffany’s into the Haymarket for its theatrical debut, he was the obvious man for the job of host and we were thrilled when he accepted.

He began with an insight into the chaotic and bumby ride the book took in Hollywood on its road to the screen and then, by reading fragments from the novelette, he gave a wonderful insight into its transition from book to stage and then told us, along with the Penguin edition of the original Truman Capote novelette, tiaras and mini bottles of moet, one lucky audience member would find two tickets to the new play starring Anna Friel in their goodie bag...

Sean was entertaining informative and hugely supportive for which, much thanks.

Lots of love, the flicker club