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Tom Holland and Cara Delevingne on stage?! | Romeo & Juliet and Cabaret West End theatre news
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Mickey Jo
So I already tweeted this earlier today on a social media platform that is no longer called Twitter. But I'm gonna say it again. Tom Holland did not angry dance as hard as he did in Billy Elliot for you to be making stupid Spider man jokes. See this? See this right here? This is exactly what I'm talking about. I respect your more legitimate work. I see you. Y'all can knock it off. Oh, God. Oh my God. Hey. Welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. My name is Mickey Jo and I am just obsessed with all things theatre. I am a professional theatre critic and a content creator here on social media and today I'm going to be talking to you about two of the big, biggest casting announcements to have come out in the last week. Both of these are happening in the West End over the next few months. One of them is a Hollywood superhero returning to their childhood theatrical roots. And the other is a famous supermodel who is going to be making their stage debut. But you've already seen their faces on the thumbnail. I'm talking about Tom Holland and Cara Delevingne. They are both going to be seen on stage in London's West End this year in a few months time. Not in the same show as each other, but in equally exciting theatrical projects. One of them in a brand new production, the other as a replacement cast member. So let's talk about each of these shows and what they actually are. If you enjoy today's video, make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel. I will keep you abreast of all of the theatre news happening in the West End and on Broadway. As a critic, I also share reviews of the shows that I am invited to go and see. And there are many exciting things opening in the West End this month. I'm also still releasing reviews from my recent trip to Broadway. Finally, if you want even more theatre themed content, you can go and find me on other social media platforms. I'm also on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook. I belonged to several comm comic book forums in adolescence. That's my credibility for making this video. And also while you're watching this video, don't forget to comment down below with your thoughts and feelings about this particular casting. Do you already have tickets? Are you excited about getting tickets? Are you nervous about getting tickets? Because honestly, same. So let's get into it. So let's start with Tom Holland because this news literally broke this morning and I lost my entire mind. Literally. Imagine my face this morning as I read the email headline, Tom Holland stars in The Jamie Lloyd Company's new production of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet at the Duke of York's Theatre. So plenty to unpack here immediately before we even get into the details. This is Tom Holland, best known to audiences internationally as Marvel's most recent Spider Man. Having starred in Spider Man Homecoming, Spider Man Far From Home, and Spider man no Way Home, I can only assume that Spider Spider Man, Home from the second act of the Wiz is still in development. That's one of my dumber jokes. And he's been seen in other films alongside this. He is, you know, a burgeoning Hollywood star and prior to this, he was one of the many young actors to play the role of Billy Elliot in the musical Billy Elliot, which requires an immense amount of dance ability. Aside from anything else, you're also acting, you're also singing, but it's a really challenging dance role. Dance chops that he famously proved on television. Lip syncing to Rihanna's Umbrella. And if you haven't seen that clip on YouTube, you now know what, watch next. But this marks an exciting stage return for him. And like many actors who have made it big in Hollywood, he is going to return to the stage with something esteemed and something serious and something legitimate that shows his acting chops. And he is going to do Shakespeare. But because he is also a young man with these boyish looks, he is going to play Romeo in Romeo and Juliet, which, if you are asking my opinion, is one of the more overdone Shakespeare productions. Like, we get that. We get Midsummer Night's Dream, we get Hamlet every time someone feels the need to massage their own ego. We get King Lear when someone wants to massage their ego again but have aged. But I've become sidetracked. Tom Holland doing Romeo and Juliet playing Romeo. Obviously we're not doing an exciting gender swapped thing here, but this is probably going to be a pretty exciting production because it is going to be directed by Jamie Lloyd. So let's talk about this. This is going to be from the Jamie Lloyd Company. Jamie Lloyd, who is maybe one of the most exciting directors worldwide. He is known for reviving old works, whether those are classic play, whether those are musicals. Most recently, he has gained acclaim for his visionary, bold reimagining of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Sunset Boulevard, which was hugely well received in the West End starring Nicole Scherzinger and is set to announce the Broadway theatre where it will be playing later this year. Keep an eye out on the Olivier Awards, which I'll be doing lots of coverage on. Obviously here on my channel over the next few months to see just how many sunset wins. And certainly that's what everyone is associating him with right now. But I am old enough, theatrically speaking, to have seen various Jamie Lloyd shows prior to this. I have seen his productions of the Seagull starring Emilia Clarke. Of Game of Thrones. I have seen his production of Cyrano starring James McAvoy, also Hollywood star. I didn't get to see A Doll's House on Broadway starring Jessica Chastain, but you're beginning to hear a theme. Classic shows, big Hollywood names. In fact, the last play of his I saw at the Duke of York's Theatre where Tom Holland will be doing Romeo and Juliet was Dr. Faustus starring Kit Harington, also of Game of Thrones. And Mr. Lloyd has become known for various things throughout these productions. They have become increasingly minimal. This was not always the case. There's often been a focus on microphones. Whether it's like an actual handheld microphone or just like an over the ear microphone taped really close to the mouth so that you can hear every single line that the actors are saying, even if it's like a hushed whisper. It's this gritty, naturalistic realism. True enough, the aesthetics of his productions have become increasingly stark. Sunset Boulevard was pretty devoid of color. It was all very black and white. You know, it was adapting an old black and white film. So there was a logic to that. It also meant that when he deployed this stunning, all consuming red, that, that was very powerful. And the other thing that he loves just as much as microphones historically is blood. Going back to his productions of Urinetown, that production of Dr. Faustus, the curtain call of Sunset Boulevard. He's a big fan. Blood. There is a lot of blood in a Jamie Lloyd show. And I get the feeling this is going to have lots of blood as well. I feel like this is going to be a particularly gnarly Romeo and Juliet because if you click on the website, not only do we have this lovely production artwork here of Tom Holland's face, but all red. The teaser line that we are leading with here is violent delights have violent ends. And given that this is meant to be like Shakespeare's greatest love story, for that to be the focus and for it to be announced with just Tom Holland as Romeo, no Juliet yet. And we'll talk about that in a minute. That's very intriguing. As to what Jamie Lloyd is envisioning for this particular production, I don't think it's going to be necessarily romantic, which honestly is more interesting to me when it comes to Romeo and Juliet, something that we've seen rehashed every which way. Like we've seen it as a racial and cultural commentary done both ways. We have seen it as a musical, we have seen it gender swapped, we've seen it contemporary, we've seen it with animated gnomes, for crying out loud. And by the way, if you haven't seen Gnomeo and Juliet, it's a modern classic. But my expectation for this production is that we probably will continue with the minimal set design he's been moving towards. He used to like furniture and set pieces, just not so much recently. I mean, I'm not expecting a traditional balcony. There might be something tongue in cheek with the way that this is reconceived. It wouldn't surprise me, honestly, if Juliet was like in the dress circle of the theater and Tom Holland was like mid stools playing it up like nothing is impossible after what they did in Sunset Boulevard. Like, he has rewritten the rule book enough times. The other thing that we have to address here is why he keeps working with celebr. And it's a pretty great model because it allows him to take these artistic liberties and to still do this really fulfilling artistic work while pretty much guaranteeing he's going to have sellout. Commercial success like this will for sure sell out prior to opening night, which also will mean that it's already sold really well prior to what the critics say. Now, speaking of selling, let me give you some of these ticket on sale details in case you are curious and want to try and get tickets for yourself. Tickets go on sale to those signed up for priority booking and ATG members on Tuesday 13th February at 8am, general booking opens on the same day, but at midday at 12pm the actual production runs at the Duke of York's Theatre in the West End, which is on St Martin's Lane between Saturday 11th May and Saturday 3rd August 2024. Will it do a little extension? If it doesn't, then it's probably because of filming commitments. Because if they wanted to, they could absolutely run this through the rest of the summer holidays and go through to September also. And I want to bring this to your attention because this is something they did in Sunset Boulevard as well. And it is important to note the Jamie Lloyd also continues its commitment to accessibility, offering 10,000 tickets priced at 25 pounds and under with 5,000 of these exclusively for under 30s, key workers and those receiving government benefits. Further information to be announced, Usually they Don't go on sale at the same time as the general release. So it's up to you whether you want to gamble and hope that you can get one of those, because those will also be popular. Needless to say, Tom Holland has many young fans under 30 who are going to want to snap those up. We also, as part of this email, have a nice little quote from Jamie Lloyd, who says of Tom Holland that he is one of of the greatest, most exciting young actors in the world. It's an honour to welcome him back to the West End. That's very sweet. And here's what we're actually told about the production, because it's not much. Tom Holland is Romeo in Jamie Lloyd's pulsating new vision of Shakespeare's immortal tale of wordsmiths, rhymers, lovers and fighters. Ending with fighters there. I do think that's going to be a really big component of this. Lists all his credits. Lists all his credits. Talking about the Jamie Lloyd Company, talking about the producers. Fine. No additional details there. We do get told some of the creative team. The text's been edited by Neiman Talahani. Set and costume designed by Sutra Gilmour, frequent collaborator of Jamie Lloyd's. One of these days, Sutra's gonna turn up to a production meeting and Jamie's actually gonna want them to build a set, and they're gonna be shocked. Sound design is by Ben and Max Ringham. Lighting design by John Clarke. Video design and cinematography. Okay, now we know something. Video design, cinematography. Once again, are we going to be using cameras? Nathan Amzi and Joe Ransom, who worked on the same feature in Sunset Boulevard. That seems to imply we're gonna have the camera thing again now in Sunset Boulevard. I defended that because it is something we're seeing increasingly frequently on stage. Ivo Van Hove likes it a lot. Jamie Lloyd likes it a lot. And it made sense for Sunset because the story was being told through this cinematic lens. The narrator was a screenwriter. It was all about Hollywood. It was based on a film. Romeo and Juliet does not readily have the same lens. True enough, he's a film star we know, for having superpowers. But I'm gonna need to put on some good shoes if you're gonna walk me all the way up to the idea of Romeo and Juliet. Have cameras on stage, maybe like hiking boots. We also know that music is going to feature because Michael, Mikey J. Asante is credited as the composer. Stuart Burt is the casting director. Sarah Golding and Yukiko Masui are the movement directors. The intimacy coordinator, Ingrid McKinnon, that's a very important role and tells us there's going to be a certain amount of intimacy. But honestly, most shows should have intimacy coordinators. The associate director is Jonathan Glue, and the associate designer is Rachel Wingate. I do think I've pulled everything out of that press release that I can. I think what's interesting here is that there is clearly this desire for celebrities to continue working with Jamie Lloyd. You know, Nicole Scherzinger spoke about having a positive experience, and he gets a lot out of them. He isn't giving them this opportunity to just, like, swan in and do a little bit and show off and take a massive paycheck. Like, consistently, he gets these performers to subvert their own celebrity, to go several extra miles. And the commitment that he asks of his performers and the performances that he elicits from them are so immense and so powerful and so, you know, free that he must provide a very exciting and nurturing creative space in which to develop those. I would love to chat to him about how he works with these celebrities and makes them feel comfortable and empowered for these stage performances. The production I'm expecting this to bear the closest resemblance to is that revival of Doctor Faustus starring Kit Harington. There just seem to be similarities in the presentation of this in the way that it's being marketed. What I remember of that was a lot of kind of abstract framing, but also lots of blood and more than a little bit of nudity. So take from that what you will. As for the Tom Holland of it all, he's performed on stage before, I don't think that this is the most, like, taxing or challenging choice for him to go and be Romeo, Romeo and Juliet, to play, like, a young romantic lead in a Shakespeare. Like I said, they always do Shakespeare. It's what they gravitate to. If he was doing, like, a bold, exciting new play, I would be even more interested. But this does mean that the text being malleable as it is with Shakespeare, like I said, we've seen Romeo and Juliet done so many hundreds of times, they're going to be able to shape this around him and what he wants to do on stage and what Jamie Lloyd is going to try and get him to do on stage. So it's going to be a true sort of a theatrical star vehicle. Very intrigued to see who will be playing Juliet. And, like, the Internet is probably going to want Zendaya to do it. And I guess, like, spoofing their own real relationship on stage would be interesting. Kind of like how Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick currently are in Plaza Suite, which has recently transferred to London from Broadway. But also, that feels a little less legitimate than Jamie Lloyd is usually known for being. I wouldn't be surprised if the rest of this cast are filled with veteran West End actors of an immense pedigree. Look at the ensemble casting of Sunset Boulevard. Look at the ensemble cast assembled for the Seagull and Cyrano. If they're not actors of established quality, then they are fantastic rising stars who he has a great talent for spotting along with Stuart Burt, casting director. But Tom is not the only star name who has been announced for a West End role recently, because we also have to talk about Cara Delevingne playing Sally Bowles in Cabaret. So I feel like I followed Cara Delevingne's career less closely than Tom Holland's. I'm aware that she has segued from the modeling world into acting roles like she again was in a superhero movie. She was in the Suicide Squad, right. And I know her as an actress from the second season of Only Murders in the Building. And she was charming and she was fine. But that is nothing like the kind of a nuanced performance she would need to give in a stage role, let alone Sally Bowles and Cabaret. So lots to talk about here. Let me find this press release searching for Cabaret because I definitely can't spell Delevingne. There's an N before the G. There's two N's either side of the G. You know, I wouldn't have guessed that. So we are going to talk about Cara. What I don't want to lose in this is that they have announced pair of new leads. This is how they do it at Cabaret. They have rotating leads as Sally Bowles and the mc. They don't really care about Cliff quite as much, although they have recently announced that Michael Homka Lindsay from Newsies from Legally Blonde at Regent's Park Open Air Theatre is going in as Cliff. And I'm very excited about that. But the star names are usually reserved for the MC and Sally Bowles and they do these short stints and then they announce new starry casting. That's how they keep the interest in this very lavish production, very expensive production as well. And alongside Kara, Luke Treadaway has been announced for the mc. If you're not sure who he is, he's a veteran stage performer who's also done some screen work. But he was in War Horse. He won the Olivier Award for originating the role of Christopher Boone in the Curious Case of the Dog in the Night Time. What did I call that? Curious Case Incident. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night. It's not Benjamin Button. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime and he's not someone I've ever associated with musical theatre before. And the MC is not the most vocally demanding role, but we have had quite a few performers in that role recently who are more known for the musical theatre and singing world. Jake Shears of the Scissor Sisters is currently playing the role. John McCrae from Everybody's Talking About Jamie and Fra Fee and Mason Alexander park have also played it recently. But Luke is such a fantastic actor, I am very intrigued to see what he does with this. The headline news, however, is that he is going to be joined by Cara Delevingne and this is going to be from 11 March until 1 June 2024. This year Cabaret plays at the KitKat Club at the Playhouse Theatre in London, just on the north side of the Thames, and it is, as this press release mentions, a multi award winning, critically acclaimed West End revival. It's also booking until February 2025, so they will have new leads to announce in the not too distant future. We have words from Cara and Luke so Cara Delevingne said today, there are no words to explain the excitement I have to return home to make my stage debut in such an iconic role. She's British, so this sounds accurate. I'm so inspired by the brilliant actors who have played Sally in past productions around the world. I mean, true enough, we've had what Natasha Richardson and Jane Horrocks and Emma Stone and Sienna Miller and everyone in this recent London production, Jessie Buckley and Amy Lennox and Amy Lou Wood. Just amazing, amazing actresses. And in this one in the West End, she said, acknowledging those I cannot wait to be a part of this brilliant cast and production. More on her in a moment. Luke Treadaway said, I can't wait to become a member of the KitKat club and join this extraordinary production. It's a thrill to be asked to take this on and I'm very excited to get started. Fun fact, he's an identical twin. It doesn't really play into anything here. Thought you just might like to know. Let's read Cara Delevingne's bio here because I don't know enough about her. Like does she have any kind of music in her history? She's one of the most recognizable faces in the world. True most known for her work across the entertainment and fashion industry. Her film credits include Anna Karenina, Paper Town's Suicide Squad. There you go. Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. The Face of an Angel. Her Smell Life in a Year and tell it like a woman. More film work than I was aware of them Only murders in the building. She's also been seen on TV in Amazon's Carnival Row Planet, Sex. That sounds demure. And most recently in Ryan Murphy's American Horror Story. Delicate. A talented singer and drummer. Kara's Pharrell Williams produced song I Feel Everything was featured on the soundtrack of her film Valyrian and the City of a Thousand platform. Okay, we need to. We need to listen to this immediately. I'm doing some journalism right now and I'm doing it on Spotify. Delevingne, ngne nailed it. Oh, okay. Oh, okay. I mean, it's produced, but a tune is being carried and there is tone. That's interesting. Sallies have gotten away with far less in the past. I don't even know if I need to listen to much more of this. This is brought an immense amount of comfort. Okay, so now I'm not worried about the vocals at all because the thing with Sally Bowles, especially in this production, is she doesn't need to be a brilliant singer. She's not performing at this seedy nightclub in Berlin because she's a phenomenal talent. What she has is grit and determination and charm, and that's what's got her to where she is. All characteristics that I think Cara Delevingne will be able to naturally portray quite well. This is an interesting choice for her as a stage debut because it's a heck of a role. It's a huge leading role, in fact. Fact, she was one of the many rumoured names to be taking the role on in the show's Broadway transfer, and if she had done that, then she would have been eligible for a Tony Award. As it stands, she's going to be a replacement cast member in the West End, which won't put her in awards contention other than for, like the Watson Stage Award for best replacement, which it's never too early to campaign for. But I actually think this is really exposing and challenging role to take on because it's a significant emotional arc. There's a lot of. Of depth and a lot of challenge and balance in this role, especially when Sally is visibly ignorant to the realities of what is happening around her socially and politically. With the rise of fascism in 1930s Berlin, the complicated nature of her relationship with Cliff and how intuitive she is about his personality, and then the meaning behind all of these musical performances that are hugely emotionally loaded but without the dialogue to communicate that. So you have to act through song enough to express the intention to the audience. It's a big acting challenge. I'm not worried about the vocal. I'm not worried about the accent because she is British. The thing that makes me less concerned because it's I don't see her as a formidably experienced actress in what I've seen her in before. The thing that's mitigating that worry is the fact that I don't think Sally Bowles is too far from her fingertips, just personally. And that is meant to be nothing other than complimentary. But when I saw Maud App and in the role, for example, who is an American performer, I felt like a lot of work was being done just to get over the accent of it all. And Kara not only has the accent already, but kind of the sensibility. It seems like for her to be playing as seen as Sally Bowles may not be the greatest stretch in the world. I feel like she's going to be able to come up with that characterization pretty quickly and then that gives her more time to explore the nuances. Also, I trust Rebecca Fregnell. Rebecca Fregnell has made pretty great casting decisions up to this point. I believe in this revival. So I'm cautiously optimistic for Kara and Cabaret. Let's talk about some more details from this press release because there's an unfortunately lengthy paragraph here that details the dates she won't be performing. And if you really want to see her, then you can find these online or you may want to write them down. So she's not going to be performing the matinee of Wednesday 13th of March, the evening of Thursday 21st of March, or the matinee of Wednesday 27th of March. Also the evening of Thursday 4th of April. Any of the performances between the 9th of April and the 12th of April inclusive. Also the evening of Thursday 18th of April, the matinee of Wednesday the 24th, the evening of Thursday 2nd of May, Monday 6th of May through Wednesday 8th of May inclusive, none of those performances Thursday 16th of May through Saturday 18th of May inclusive, None of those Wednesday 22nd of May matinee and the evening performance of Thursday 30th of May. When does she finish in the role? Oh, she finishes on the 1st of June, but she's not doing the 30th of May. That seems puzzling. She'll be back on the 31st. She'll do the performances on the 1st and then she'll be done. So at those Performances. Nick Myers, who is the alternate, will be playing the role of Sally Bowles. And I'm assuming that Nick doesn't have another alternate date each week alongside those. I'm assuming that those are the Nick Myers performances and they're not additional to the alternate ones. In which case, and there's been a lot of talk about this online because people have added it up, up and there are 22 performances for which Kara is going to be absent. However, in a 12 week run, she would be missing 12 anyway because the role has an alternate for one performance a week, which has been the case for over a year now. Actually, Maybe it's a 10 week run. Did I say 12? In any case, she is scheduled to not be performing at just over double the number of performances that her predecessors in the role have been. But she is a big star with big commitments and sometimes this is what you get for starry casting. If you have already bought tickets, then you may be disappointed if you're not going to be seeing her at one of those performances. However, if you bought tickets before this announcement, you didn't know who it was going to be. So, you know, I also think that this is the price that you sometimes have to pay with courting really big names in the theatre. And I am all for alternates and understudies having regular performance opportunities. On average she is going to be out like twice a week rather than once a week, but that's still not that much in the grand scheme of things and it's great for Nick Myers. Maybe that's a contentious opinion and you don't agree and you think, think that when these stars go to a theatrical performance they should give it their all and that there are stars who don't miss any performances throughout their run. And that's true. But as long as we don't end up seeing a host of other unscheduled absences throughout the run, then I think she's doing a pretty good job. Especially because those dates make it look like she has a bunch of prior commitments that would ordinarily preclude her from being able to do stage work at all. Instead, she's just trying to fit it around the stuff that she has to go and do because she's Cara Delevingne and like Nicole Scherzinger did not miss performances in Sunset Boulevard, but she did have an alternate for her previously scheduled absences as well as for one show a week, the incredible Rachel Tucker. Everything else in this is stuff that we already know about this revival of Cabaret, which I've talked about a few times here on my channel. If you want to know more about this production, if you haven't seen it before, I've done a review video that also talks about this pseudo immersive pre show element and what actually happens in this production and what you can expect if you're going to the KitKat Club aka the Playhouse Theatre for the first time. I've also made subsequent videos talking about some of the replacement cast members. So if you want to learn a little bit more about Rebecca Frecknell's revival of Cabaret, you can go and watch some of those. In the meantime, those are all of my thoughts on Tom Holland and Cara Delevingne coming to the West End. Again. Comment down below. Have you already got tickets to see Cara in Cabaret? And are you going to be trying to get tickets to see Tom Holland in Romeo and Juliet? I am so intrigued about both of these performances. Hopefully I may get a chance to see one or both of them in the West End this summer. I cannot guarantee anything to you. I will obviously do my best to try and buy tickets. It is not a given that I will be allocated press tickets. I may be to find out. You will just have to watch this space. In the meantime, there will be many more reviews and more West End news coming very soon. Make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel if you don't want to miss out and I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a Stagey Day. For 10 more seconds. I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a stagey day. Subscribe.