It's time for my review of Young Frankenstein.Young Frankenstein had been on my West End wish-list for quite a while now, but I had never gotten around to seeing it. This Thursday, after going into London to get day seats for the matinee of 'Heisenberg: The Uncertainty Principle', I stopped by the Garrick Theatre to enquire if they had any day seats left for the evening performance, and luckily they did!
Young Frankenstein sees Frederick Frankenstein, an esteemed New York brain surgeon and professor, inherit a castle and laboratory in Transylvania from his deranged genius grandfather, Victor Von Frankenstein. He now faces a dilemma - does he continue to run from his family’s tortured past or does he stay in Transylvania to carry on his grandfather’s mad experiments reanimating the dead and, in the process, fall in love with his lab assistant Inga? The show follows such bizarre and crazy events and it is utterly hilarious! Similar to Mel Brooks' other hit musical, The Producers, Young Frankenstein has punchline after punchline. Young Frankenstein pulls out all the stops to be very funny and as a result it is extremely amusing from beginning to end.
Young Frankenstein has a terrific cast full of genuinely talented and comedic actors and actresses who give their all. The casting for this show has been brilliant; each actor and actress seem so well suited to their parts. Each and every individual in this cast is brilliant and this seems to be the perfect show for them to showcase their talents. Cast members who stood out were Hadley Fraser as Frederick Frankenstein, Ross Noble as Igor, Summer Strallen as Inga, Lesley Joseph as Frau Blücher, Shuler Hensley as The Monster and Patrick Clancy as Inspector Kemp and the Hermit.
On the whole, the score that featured in Young Frankenstein is great. I really liked the music itself, however the lyrics could possibly do with some tweaking in several songs, due to the fact they did come across as juvenile in places. My highlights from the score were "Together Again" and "He Vas My Boyfriend". Whilst a very large portion of the songs were memorable, it was these two songs that truly stayed with me. Carrying out this score were a wonderful orchestra who were faultless.
Susan Stroman has been both an excellent director and choreographer for Young Frankenstein. The Garrick Theatre stage, where Young Frankenstein is playing, is fairly small, so staging a big musical on this stage must have originally seemed like a very difficult task. However, Susan Stroman has made it work and the final results are brilliant. The choreography really stood out throughout the whole performance and was truly exceptional!The featured star of Young Frankenstein is, drum roll please... HADLEY FRASER!
With such a phenomenal cast, choosing featured star was always going to be a tough task. However, with the type of talent that Hadley has, I had to award him with featured star. He's funny, he's convincing, he's a great singer and he has a big stage presence; he's an all-rounder!
Now for my final verdict on Young Frankenstein. I give Young Frankenstein...
Young Frankenstein is a truly hysterical show with a cast full of insanely talented actors and actresses! I am sure it will have a lengthly West End run.
Think it should have got a higher rating? Agree with my rating? Think it should have got a lower rating? If so comment below.
Thanks for reading!
-The Reviewer
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