High School Musical - Palace Theatre - 23/06/08 by Kashif Naveed

I have been sent on various assignments on behalf of Entertainment Manchester over the years. Some have been the hottest tickets in town (not often enough if you ask me as the Editor of the site seems the snap up the most sought after ones for himself!), some have been to the most talked about shows in town, some have been the most controversial, others award winning. I think you are starting to get my drift dear reader. However, even for a seasoned reviewer like myself I was wholly unprepared for what awaited me as I took me seat for Disney's High School Musical.

For Manchester's Palace Theatre seemed to be besieged by screaming kids (bless their cotton socks!) all wanting a piece of cutesy, lovable, family-fun Disney action. You could almost touch the excitement that had been generated by a theatre throng full of children almost unable to contain said excitement.

And who could blame them given the meteoric rise of the High School Musical. This was after all a made-for-TV production that became a global phenomenon. The album was the best selling the year it was released (2006 for those who want to know), and sequel has proved just as successful. Number three is in the pipeline and number four has also been recently announced. Big is not the word.

I had myself managed to come across the phenomenon during the festive holidays and was taken aback at how much appeal it had. So was more than intrigued to see how and what Disney would do to translate what was perhaps the most translatable films onto the wooden boards of theatre-land.

Once the din had died down dear readers, obviously, the show was everything you would expect from the hands of Disney or anything to do with Disney. A super slick intro heralded the opening number and set the tone of what was to come, that was a smooth well oiled choreographic machine.

The story was much the same you could expect from the film version (you might think this is not a point worth making, however, dear readers I have managed to watch productions that have rarely resembled their film counterparts). It was the old, old, story about two high school juniors from rival cliques (See Grease for more info). Troy Bolton is captain of the basketball team whilst Gabriella Montez is a beautiful but shy student who excels in maths and science. Together, they try out for the lead parts in their high school musical, and as a result, divide the school. In spite of others trying to thwart their dreams, Troy and Gabriella prevail, inspiring others not to "stick with the status quo."

The cast and crew hardly put a foot wrong all night with Ashley Day excelling as Troy, whilst Lorna Want proved to be more than his match as the feisty Gabriella. What helped their performance I think was that us Mancunians are in the middle of this production's tour and therefore any gremlins kinks and other odd obscurities have been ironed out. Also the cast seem to just about getting in the swing of things, having performed it just enough to know their parts inside out and not too much to have grown accustomed to lazy idiosyncrasies.

And what of those screaming kids? Well if the ones I sat to are anything to judge by, who sang word for word every musical number in the show, then the show was nothing but a resounding hit. After all that’s what it is all about.d