Edges at the Landor Theatre

I went to see Edges at the Landor Theatre tonight. It is a musical by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul about coming of age and self-discovery and is put on by the Notion Theatre Company, which was founded by two Arts Ed graduates, Michaela Cartmell-Hull and Billy Cullum,  to create more opportunities for graduates.

In short (no pun intended): it was great! It is one of the most talented casts I’ve ever seen and they worked so well together. It is very different to the show I saw two years ago at the Union Theatre, mainly because then it was a cast of four and there was a story fitted around the songs, which followed those four characters. This production features a cast of 18 incredibly talented young actors and actresses, whose vocals gave me goosebumps more than once.

I don’t want to single anyone out, but I’ll quickly go through some of my highlights.

“Caitlyn and Haley” was sung by Michaela Cartmell-Hull and Emily-Jane Morris. It is a beautiful song about two sisters slowly growing apart.

“I Once Knew”, about the death of their mother, is one of those songs that you can’t get out of your head for a while and was very well sung by two of the men.

“Man of my Dreams”, sung by Emily-Jane Morris again, is a hilarious song about, as the title already says, the man of her dreams.

The absolute highlight for me though was “Part of a Painting”, mainly sung by Lewis Grant, who was joined by the rest of the male cast members. It’s such a beautiful song itself, but the voices blended so well together that it was pure joy to watch/listen.

The only aspects of the show that I was less keen off were parts of the choreography. While it was very well done, I thought that it would have been better without the dancing in-between songs. It just tended to look cluttered, which is obviously due to the limited space at the Landor and might work better in another venue.

All in all, this is a wonderful production and I’m sure I’ll see many of the cast members in other productions in the future. It finishes its run this Sunday,  5th June, so you better be quick with booking tickets for it! You won’t regret it, I promise!