A free Friday night and a friend who also fancied a show led us to book tickets for Mean Girls two days in advance via Today Tix (we found £45 tickets in row J of the stalls, which felt like a good price!). We both went in completely blind having not seen the film.
The ensemble cast in this show were incredible, and the direction and choreography was fantastic – there were a lot of people on a fairly small stage yet this worked perfectly for this show when you naturally would have a lot of students in a school canteen (for example).
I found the video backgrounds vibrant and eye catching and they enabled changes of settings or mood effectively; this really enhanced the show.
The thing I can't praise highly enough about this show is the cast, what a talented bunch of performers and there were several of them who had their own moment to shine. The two who really stood out for me were Elena Skye as Janis and Tom Xander as Damian, the scenes they were in were definitely my favourites. Elena delivered a fantastic solo performance in the second half and Tom was simply hilarious every time he was on stage. This show was worth seeing for them alone.
Daniel Bravo was convincing as heartthrob Aaron, and Georgina Castle played the unlikeable Regina brilliantly. This character is so funny that you have to like her even though she is the kind of person you’d avoid at school. Regina’s friends Gretchen (Elena Gyasi) and Karen (Grace Mouat) were also hilarious and fun to watch.
Clíona Flynn was brilliant in the role of Cady. I didn’t realise until after the show that she is a standby performer, and she was amazing (I always enjoy seeing cover/standby/understudy/swing performances). We also had Fergie Fraser on for Ms Heron/Ms Norbury /Mrs George.
The music I found okay. The songs were performed wonderfully by the cast, but none of them have really stuck in my head unfortunately.
My friend enjoyed this show a lot. I could tell a lot of the audience loved it, I suspect some of them were also fans of the film. Although the performances and video backgrounds were top notch, it was watchable entertainment but as a show it didn’t resonate with me unfortunately.
⭐⭐⭐
