"British" play recommendation - for teenagers
 

Hello Fodorites!
I've read most of the posts around theatre but am not finding exactly what I need. My family, including two older teenage sons, will be in London June 9 & 10 (2011) and I would love to take them to the theatre in the evening (they are too young to go club hopping...or I am too old!).

I'd like to take them to a non-broadway, 'british' play if possible. With over 200 plays available I'm having trouble finding something appropriate. Any suggestions? worst case I can go to Les Miz as it is always a good show but I'm hoping to find something more 'british' if that makes sense?

Looking forward to hearing suggestions from the experts!

http://www.lastminute.com/site/deals...f/theatre.html

refer to this website, it not only gives the listing of all plays/theatre in London, it also gives you good deals

I wanted to go to Lion King or Wizard of Oz last time i was in London, however missed it due to excess of work! lol :)

Have fun!

I would NOT take them to Les Miserables. First, it's depressing. Second, it is frighteningly dull. I saw it when I was a teen and could not wait for the end -- it is a melodramatic tragedy in near-operatic form because there is almost no dialogue that is not sung. Your teenage sons will be bored stiff.

What's a "non-broadway british play"? TheatRE productions in London very frequently become theatER productions in New York. Shrek, Billy Elliot, Wicked, Les Mis, Legally Blonde, Lion King, Phantom of the Opera, Chicago and more all started in the West End or London theatres before going to NYC. So British plays become Broadway plays at a high rate.

If you want something profoundly British and reputedly very good, take them to see The 39 Steps.

If you want them entertained, then Billy Elliot would work.

I second The 39 Steps. It's great fun.

Do you want a play or a musical? The recommendations above are for musicals. I saw Billy Elliot and Wicked last summer, and both were great (though Wicked was my favorite).

If you want a play, check out the Globe Theater for their schedule. I really loved the night I spent at the Globe.

http://www.shakespearesglobe.com/

If you want "British" theatre please don't limit your review to American musicals. There is outstanding theater of all types throughout central London. A great guide to what's on (and museums, restaurants and other entertainment too all with a "hipper" slant) is www.timeout.com (London version) with listings by date or area.

Could you tell us the ages of the "older teenagers" as to me that would mean 18-19 yr olds whose interests would be more adult than younger teenagers

Look up War Horse. we loved the acting , the script and the astaging is fantastic. The featured actor plays a teenager

thank you everyone. Great feedback so far. By 'non-broadway' I mean something I can't see on broadway, like all the big musicals (Wicked, billy elliot, etc). I'm looking for something that is very English. Perhaps 39 steps? It doesn't have to be a musical - but I would prefer a comedy.

Though I totally disagree with BigRuss about Les Mis (one of my all-time favorites!), I agree that 39 Steps is really entertaining. And it's quite "British" enough for you, I think. War Horse is supposed to be wonderful but I haven't seen it myself.

both war horse and 39 steps look great! thanks everyone and I love both the time out and last minute sites - great info!

My 14-year-old loved "Billy Elliot" last summer, even though it had toured in our city, we hadn't seen it and personally I would prefer to see it with a British cast.
We will be in London again this summer and will seriously consider "War Horse," which is being made into a film under the aegis, I think of Stephen Spielberg. If we see it I know my daughter will love to tell her friends that she saw the play in London! 39 steps sounds intriguing also. Have fun.

We saw Billy Elliot in London with a "British" cast. The Billy that night (they rotate three due to labor laws and the strain on the kids) was Tanner Pflueger.

He's from Nebraska.

Mousetrap? The longest running show in history, Agatha Christie, very British.

https://www.the-mousetrap.co.uk/online/default.asp

I saw The 39 Steps a few weeks back (half price ticket from Leicester Square) - very entertaining and would have been enjoyed by my teenager.

The Woman in Black has been running for years. It definitely meets the "British" criterion and has lots of genuinely scary moments which is really difficult to achieve on stage with none of the tricks available to filmakers. I guarantee you will jump out of your seat on several occasions.

I realise that ghost stories are not to everyone's tsate but if you and your teenagers do like this sort of thing then I can also recommend the aptly named "Ghost Stories." It's written by and stars Andy Nyman who produced the Derren Brown shows. It also has some real "jump out of your skin" moments.

Blood Brothers is very English. It's another that has been running for ages. Musical and not funny, but we really liked it.

I would recommend War Hourse or if you just want a laugh, The 39 Steps. If you go to the former, I recommend watching the Alfred Hitchcock movie first as it's easier to understand the jokes IMHO.

As for Blood Brothers, it's not a play to go to if you are feeling depressed. Very dark and the mother is a fantastic singer but I wasn't wowed by it.

I'd also check to see what else is playing at the National besides War Horse

There are three reasons you're getting such a tired list of tourist-oriented cliches.

1. You posted at 7 pm (our time), after everyone had knocked off for the night.
2. Most British plays really don't appeal to tourists, of any sort. Browse through the lists at www.timeout.com and at any one moment, about 90% of British plays on in London are too new, demanding, mediocre, political or rude (or often all five at once) for visitors: even the most stage-struck
3. The business model for most London theatre means no-one's seen what you're probably really looking for.

There are three business models for straight plays in London. Remember, of course, that the endless mantra on this site ("go to the TKTS kiosk") limits you to plays no-one wants to see, or to plays deliberately booked into big theatres so that they can sell tickets via TKTS to undiscriminating tourists.

a. Tourist-centred, commercially operated, artistic mediocrities. Practically everything listed above. 39 Steps is a kind of exception, but you really need to read the reviews. This is more of a play about how stuffy Edwardians were (about as inaccurate a modern delusion as it's possible to invent) and how clever the actors are than a retelling of a classic novel.

b. Often outstanding productions at the main subsidised theatres. These typically have three month runs in repertory: most of what'll be on in June's not on now, so 99% of recommendations today are irrelevant to you. You either have to decide in advance blind from the theatres' website, or make a shortlist before you travel and buy what there are still tickets for when you arrive. For critical successes - the plays that'll be on Broadway in a year or so - there's a window of at most a week between first night (or rather, the next day's rave reviews) and the whole run selling out. If you can identify plays during this window, they're likely to be what you really want.
They are most likely to be at:
- The National
- The Royal Court
- The Almeida
- The Old Vic
- The Donmar Warehouse
- The Menier Chocolate Factory
- The Hampstead Theatre (Royal Shakespeare Co)
Though there may be something extraordinary at one of a couple of hundred pubs, most of us find the play everyone else has seen and we can't get tickets for is most often at one of these seven.

c. Commercially-produced high quality, ungimmicky, straight plays. At most theatres (like the Vaudeville in the Strand) these are all three-month runs, so no-one will yet have seen what's on in June. 39 Steps is one exception, but a far better one is Pygmalion at the Garrick in Charing Cross Rd. A classic English (well, some might say Irish, of course) play, played straight and well, and with just one legitimate, but still eye-catching, gimmick: Diana Rigg, who played Eliza Dolittle back when we all had unprintable fantasies about her after her Avengers role, now plays Henry Higgins' mother.

For this third group, probably best to browse the theatre section of www.timeout.com - THEN BOOK ONLINE. I say again: little worthwhile, especially in a peak season like June when most Londoners haven't decamped to the Dordogne, makes it to TKTS.

There is a fourth group: interestingly tweaked Shakespeare. Most famously, the Globe and Regents Park Open Air Theatre, though it's not totally exhausting to get a train to Stratford in time for an evening at the Royal Shakespeare Company's new theatre and get back by shortly after midnight.

My short answer:

I AM British, and War Horse and The 39 Steps are exactty what I recommended last month to visiting Canadian friends with a 17-year-old son.

Rufus Wright, who plays the lead in The 39 Steps, is brilliant.

Australian friends loved War Horse.
Blythe Spirit opened last month and is booking until June 18th.
That's pretty British and funny

We're planning on War Horse with our teen son b/c friends saw it and loved it.

I'm not saying book through here but it has an excellent 'What's on' listing by date, and you can choose between 'West End' and 'Fringe and other' shows.

http://www.londontheatre.co.uk

Billy Elliott?
'Ghost stories' looks interesting, depending on their age, it has a not under 15s warning. Should be good though,excellent 'weird' British writers.

Wow, thank you all - flaneruk, you have some great insight and seemed to have nailed my problem. I'll continue to search the theatre site and we will hold off on a decision until we are closer to our departure.

Just an FYI - we will be there in June and we will also be departing from London heading for the Dordogone! Good to know there will be English, albeit the Queen's English speakers in the Dordogne while we are there.

Thank you all again.
Faye

If it helps I saw 39 Steps with my 2 teenage boys 2 weeks ago when visiting London and they loved it. And you will too. A great night out.

I just saw War Horse at Lincoln Center in NEW YORK CITY.
I absolutely love it. Highly reccomend it to you and your family.

My 28 year old son lives in London/daughter lives in Southampton. I work for the airlines and layover in London alot to meet them for dinner and plays.
I am NOT a musical person but my favs have been:
The Lion King
Jersey boys
Priscilla,Queen of the Desert
The above have the energy and fun that your kids would like along with fabulous music and costumes.

39 Steps was a sleeper(too corny) for me along with my 25 and 28 year olds.War Horse is really hard to get tickets for and they are very expensive(I have been trying for the past 6 months) so perhaps if you start now you can get some for a cheaper price.

The Regents Park Open Air Theatre is lovely if the weather's good. In June they're doing 'Lord of the Flies'.

I had no problem gettng tickets for War Horse on the National Theatre website and then picking them up at the box office on the day of performance, They are pricy though but worth every single penny.Performances sell out quickly so as far in advance as you can.Our Thus.matinee was sold out last month

Has anyone seen the Wizard of Oz or Million Dollar Quartet?

Great review on War Horse in NYC today in the Times

http://theater.nytimes.com/2011/04/1...oA5gkL5jZ2HTCA

If you're looking for a West End production (because you want the West End experience even though it's not a "Broadway" play), I would echo the above comments for The 39 Steps or Woman in Black. Both are very good, would be interesting to teenagers (male or female), and are not something that would play in NYC.

I'd also recommend checking what's playing at the Royal National Theatre (http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/) -- sometimes it's a very good Shakespearean interpretation, other times it's something more experimental. War Horse was actually a National Theatre play that was so successful they are continuing its run off-site.

I'd also recommend looking Off-West End ... this is the equivalent of Off-Broadway or "fringe" theatre. Honestly, the quality of some of these productions are hit or miss, but usually they are quite creative, the tickets are inexpensive, and it definitely gets you into a part of the city that tourists likely would not otherwise travel. Comprehensive list of Off-West End shows is here: http://www.offwestend.com/