LOTR - The stage production

[ForeverAutumn]

I saw the stage play of The Lord of the Rings last night. All I have to say is...

WOW!

At a running time of just under 3.5 hours it's longest play I've been to. But the time just flew. This was a production to end all productions. I've been to a lot of great theatre in my life (we average 6-8 major shows a year) and this is, by far, the most elaborate production that I've ever been to. It felt like we were right in the middle of Middle Earth.

I can't even begin to describe the staging. But I will say that this was the most brilliant stage design that I've seen. It used a series of elevators to change and move as the actors wandered about. Giving the illustion of hills and mountains and valleys and holes in the earth. One scene had the actors climbing a ladder to get out of tunnels and up to the surface. As they started to climb the ladder it slowly sunk into the stage as the scenery changed, so that by the time the scenery change was complete the actors were hidden under the stage and you saw them climb off of the ladder and back onto the stage now set as the surface. Confused? I guess you had to see it.

Another scene used orange strobe lights; heavy fans; smoke machines; and black confetti in the air, to make an incredible 3-D effect of a dragon blowing fire when Gandolf supposedly dies. Were were sitting the the fourth last row and could feel the wind and confetti coming at us. It was awesome.

The story itself kind of dragged at times. The show is billed as a "musical". I wouldn't call it a musical myself. Although there are some songs in the show, and one bar scene with some great choreography, most of the dialogue is just that...dialogue.

The guy who played Gollum was outstanding and totally convincing. It's hard to believe that the human body can move with such fluidity and flexibility.

The costumes were fantastic. Lots of stilts. The three horses were amazing. Since you only ever saw them in dim lighting, it really did look like horses on the stage, but through my binoculars, I could see that each horse was one person, on stilts. Their hands, looking like they were holding the reigns, actually were working the horse's head and the back of the horse was part of the costume with the back legs hidden by long flowing fabric, so that no back legs were actually necessary.

Since I didn't see the third movie and haven't read the books, I wasn't expecting the 40 foot spider that appeared in the third act. Well, here's my worst fear coming true! Once the shock wore off, I did manage to watch the scene but couldn't bring myself to put up the binoculars to see how it was done. Hubby said that it was a giant puppet with people moving the 40 foot legs up and down with sticks. Eeeeeeeek! is all I have to say about that.

And the trees were also spectacular, walking out in all their glory on, what had to be, 30 foot stilts.

But the best part of all was the sound system. The theatre was wired for surround sound. Noises in the forest moved from right to left and left to right. We were sitting in the top right-hand corner so we had a good listen to the back speakers where we heard water flowing and crowds cheering and animals howling.

All in all, this was magnificent. I believe that Toronto is the only place that LOTR is being shown right now as the opening here was the World Premiere, but I can't see it being very long before this show ends up on Broadway or in London. If you ever get the chance to see this show, do it. It was truly outstanding.

[Finch Platte]

WOW.

Great review. Thanks.

fp

[Worf101]

Where DID you see this? Is it a traveling road show? Or is it on Broadway? Nice review though, just wondering if I should see it before I disappears.

Dave

[Finch Platte]

Where DID you see this? Is it a traveling road show? Or is it on Broadway? Nice review though, just wondering if I should see it before I disappears.

Dave

Did you really read it? Last paragraph: "I believe that Toronto is the only place that LOTR is being shown right now as the opening here was the World Premiere, but I can't see it being very long before this show ends up on Broadway or in London. If you ever get the chance to see this show, do it. It was truly outstanding."

fp

[Worf101]

Did you really read it? Last paragraph: "I believe that Toronto is the only place that LOTR is being shown right now as the opening here was the World Premiere, but I can't see it being very long before this show ends up on Broadway or in London. If you ever get the chance to see this show, do it. It was truly outstanding."

fp

Word "Toronto' just slipped by me . Hadn't had my coffee yet. Actually Toronto is only about 6 hours by car, 20 minutes by puddle jumper. If I HAVE to see it I could do it that way....

Da Worfster

[topspeed]

Great review! Phantom has been the most elaborate stage that I've seen, but it sounds like this just blows it away! I hope it makes it south of the border .

[ForeverAutumn]

Word "Toronto' just slipped by me . Hadn't had my coffee yet. Actually Toronto is only about 6 hours by car, 20 minutes by puddle jumper. If I HAVE to see it I could do it that way....

Da Worfster

The downside of any production of this magnitude is that it doesn't travel well. It's just to expensive and elaborate. The cost of putting this show on was 24 million dollars! If you go to their web site, there's a good clip from The Today Show, which talks about the production and gives you glimpse of the stage and some of the characters. There's also a trailer of Production Footage, but it's quite dark due to the dark lighting used on stage through most of the production.

http://www.lotr.com/main.html