Matilda the Musical

[alobear]

I'm a big fan of Tim Minchin, but really not so much of Roald Dahl, so I was a bit ambivalent about going to see Matilda the Musical on Wednesday.  I knew nothing about the story going in, but thought I might enjoy the songs, if not the humour.  And, indeed, quite a lot of the supposedly funny bits didn't do anything for me at all, as it wasn't my kind of humour.  However, the set was amazing, and the whole show was very well staged.  A couple of songs in particular were great - School Song, When I Grow Up, and Revolting Children were my favourites.  The singing was quite indistinct for a lot of the show, which meant I probably missed a fair bit of nuance in the lyrics, but the cast were enthusiastic and definitely gave it their all.

By the interval, I thought it was okay, but I was invested enough in the story to want to know what happened.  And the second half of the second half really picked up and had me fully engaged.  I wasn't so sure about the supernatural aspects, and the whole arc of the plot was very silly, but bits of it definitely affected me, and my applause at the end was wholehearted and genuine.

So, not my favourite musical, by a long way, but I was glad I went, and I thoroughly enjoyed at least parts of it.