There is probably only one sung-through musical that could fill the Glasgow Hydro for one night, said Allan Radcliffe in The Times, let alone sell out the 12,000-capacity venue for four in a row. And that musical is “Les Misérables”, which in its new, super-sized incarnation is in the UK as part of a global arena tour taking in some 15 countries.
Generating “an atmosphere somewhere between a rock concert and a football match”, the show is truly spectacular, with thrilling lighting design, “seamless” choreography, a full-sized orchestra “floating serenely above the stage”, and vast screens broadcasting the performers’ faces. Yet for all the bombast, the evening is “at its most hypnotic in its virtuoso moments”, such as the “showstopping rendition of ‘Bring Him Home'” by Alfie Boe, as Jean Valjean.
It’s a “gargantuan” staging, said Mark Brown in The Daily Telegraph, yet there’s minimal stage scenery. Instead, light shows – sometimes so over-the-top they’re unintentionally comic – are left to do a lot of the work; and it can sometimes feel an awkward mix of concert and dramatic performance. Where it works best is in the “big, set-piece numbers” by solo performers: these are “universally fantastic”, and bring the “enthralled” audience to its feet. Channah Hewitt has a glorious voice, and her “emotive rendering of Fantine’s great song, “I Dreamed a Dream”, had the sold-out Clydeside audience in raptures”. Michael Ball is superb as Javert, while Gavin Lee and Bonnie Langford are brilliantly wicked, and funny, as the Fagin-esque innkeeper Thénardier and his sarcastic wife.
What is remarkable, said Charles Pring in The Glasgow Times, is that even in this large venue, the passion of the performers shines through. Yes, the sheer scale of the production does make it that bit harder to feel the emotional connections between the characters. But this is still a “fantastic” show, “exhilarating and life-affirming” – and “precisely as spectacular as advertised”.
P&J Live, Aberdeen, 17-20 October (then touring to 5 January)