We Will Rock You – Regent Theatre, Hanley, Stoke on Trent – 26/09/2007

I first heard about the play via the Official International Queen Fan Club website back in April and having been to many shows at the Regent theatre I was both delighted and slightly worried. Although the original news article said '…one of the biggest productions ever attempted at the Regent….' It also mentioned that this was an amateur production. I’m afraid it was the amateur word that stuck with me and worried me.

Never the less I bought tickets through the fan club and waited, waited and waited. The tickets didn’t turn up in the post so I contacted Jacky who passed me on to someone connected with the show. He emailed me and even offered to hand deliver the tickets, he turned out to be one of the cast (one of Kashoggi's police force). I declined as the email mentioned rehearsing and I didn't want to interrupt the creative process.

On the night we parked in the usual car park near the Regent Theatre and noticed a slight buzz around as people were talking about Queen and the play. In the lobby of the theatre people were selling inflatable guitars and glow sticks. We went to the box office desk and asked for the tickets, they were there in an envelope with a brief note from the aforementioned police officer. The people in the lobby and around the bar areas were ordinary Stoke on Trent citizens from the young to the young at heart. A few had Queen related gear on, a few had Fan Club Convention T-Shirts on, including me.

Getting to the seats I realised that these were some of the best in the house, and I probably would have chosen them myself if I was given a free choice. The stage was dark and a large projection screen was lowered with the Queen logo displayed on it. Suddenly the music started, not from a pre-recorded source but from a real band that were situated behind the main stage. The familiar words were then projected onto the screen to start the entertainment, it was at this point that I suddenly remembered the word 'amateur' and it seemed odd that the show had been linked with it.

Pop (Derek Yeomans) was captured and sent to the Seven Seas of Rye and then the opening number put the word even further from my mind as it was stunning, the costumes were right, the set was basic but effective with two more projection screens, and the performance of the GaGa girls and boys was excellent. The end of the song raised a round of applause that some shows would be lucky to get at their finale. This was continued throughout all the numbers with each one getting a rousing reception.

Then to the main actors, if they have not been to London to see the original and studied it then the people that produced the play have. I have seen the show in London on four occasions now, including one unforgettable night where Brian and Roger were on stage with the cast, and the Galileo (Luke Gessner) and Sacramouche (Laura Mellor) were on a par with this. They had fantastic voices as did Killer Queen (Zoe Bird) and even Kashoggi (Chris Montgomery). The main Bohemians were just right with a slight local twist thrown in. There were a few lines that were changed to suit a local audience and one joke about Jonathan Wilkes that will only be understood by people that go to that theatre.

The projection screens showed video, like in the London show, and although this was different it was still entertaining but not distracting, I have seen professional touring shows with some, quite frankly, laughable video screens, these were there for a purpose and served that purpose well. The rest of the costumes were well thought out and matched the original without effort. The sets, as mentioned before, are basic but effective, especially for a show that is only on for a few days, not a five year plus run in the same theatre ! The only set that was possibly not up to scale was Tottenham Court Road, but remembering that this is a smaller theatre and it isn't going to rise on hydraulics out of the floor, then it was perfectly acceptable.

The show flowed very well and again matched the original's pace with ease, given this is a different theatre with different people it would have been easy to change so much to suit the local conditions but the urge to tinker and change had been mostly avoided and gave a very similar feeling to the original.

Now to the negative, and I'm afraid there were some bad points, which bought me back to the ‘A’ word. The sound director seemed to be having a bad night, and on several occasions lots of feedback and extraneous noise was heard. There were a couple of occasions where the sound was lost completely, the second half opened with 'One Vision' and none of the performers microphones were turned on. Also half way through 'These are the Days of Our Lives' Pop's microphone cut out with a sound like someone was unplugging him from the mixing desk, a shame really as the first half of the song was very good, his mike didn’t come back on fully for the rest of the show.

The other slightly disappointing thing on a personal note was that the guitar at the end was not a Red Special it was a fairly ordinary looking guitar which would have been perfectly acceptable anywhere else, but as this was a Queen musical it did stick out for me. I am being critical remembering the 'A' word, but the actors were so good that the other things distracted, especially at the end which seemed slightly under rehearsed.

As mentioned above the actors had fantastic singing voices as did the ensemble cast which were made up of 33 people, something most shows at the Regent can only dream of. The performance of Bohemian Rhapsody was superb and you could tell they had practised this a lot. The band that were playing were good, not excellent, but with a little more practice at playing Queen songs they will be great, I know not everyone is Brian May !

All in all this was a fantastic show which gave more than I thought it could and when the sound problems are sorted out there would be no reason this could not tour all over the country. I left with a sense of seeing something special rather than an amateur production and I would go back to see it if it were on a longer run.

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