Calendar Girls

This is a very inspiring story and a totally different theatre production to Ghost that I saw on Friday. It was at the Winter Gardens in Blackpool. There were lots of top names in Calendar Girls, Lynda Bellingham, Jan Harvey, Deena Payne, Bruno Langley, Rula Lenska, Ruth Madoc and Joe McGann to name a few so I was really looking forward to it. (Jennifer Ellison was advertised as being in it but she wasn't.) We took my parents in law, Sylvia and Hughie, for their Christmas present as they will be away in Australia.
Well, I don't know what I can say really, it was a very big disappointment! During the first half none of the cast wore a microphone so we could barely hear anyone, that wasn't entirely their fault, it was opening night and the theatre was a sell out and so many people were coughing, sneezing and rustling. There were quite a number of people complaining around us during the interval about the sound and a lady a couple of rows back actually went to speak to a member of staff at the front. She told her they were aware of the problem and it would be sorted for the second half. Unfortunately, once they were wearing microphones it started echoing around the theatre, almost like they'd over compensated, a couple of scenes later and they did get the levels right but we felt most of the storyline was in the first half and we'd missed out on most of that! We had tickets on the far left of the theatre and the casts positioning meant we missed a few scenes, it was also chilly where we sat. Lastly there was only one exit and it was at the other side of the theatre so we were almost last out! At least I can say I've seen it but that's about all the credit I'll give it, what a shame though as it has some excellent reviews and I'm sure on another night it would have been a different experience, I'll put it down to teething troubles.