What shows to see in London?
 

My daughter and I will be in London Sept. 10-13. We both love the theater. What do all of you recommend? We both loved Momma Mia, Phantom, Les Mes, Producers when we saw them in San Francisco and we also enjoy good comedy. Thanks for your help. KOL

I saw Mary Poppins and Billy Elliot in April and I highly recommend both.

I believe Dirty Dancing will open in Sept. Anyone know anything about this yet? I have seen some ads for it.

See something Shakespearean, as they are performing all of his plays in the UK this year/next year.

If you wish to scan the theatre offerings in London, suggest you go to the Society of London Theatre website:

http://www.officiallondontheatre.co.uk

My husband, 18yo daughter and I just saw "See How They Run". It is an old fashioned comedy about vicars and imposters in WWII England ("Sargeant, arrest most of these vicars"). We laughed until we cried.

On our March London trip we saw Les Mis and a Shakespeare comedy.

Billy Elliot is great theater. Most of us Yanks would do well to brush up on Maggie Thatcher and the Miner's strike before seeing it but, it was a superb performance.

whatever you pick, you can call the theater and book your tickets directly with them. Very helpful for seat selection and to be sure the stars will be performing that show. This helped us when we saw "Chitty" because the person at the theater told us the star would not be performing on the night we orginally planned to go, so we chose a different night.

KOL,
If you enjoyed Mama Mia, then you may want to see WE Will Rock You, the play about Queen's music.

It is overacted and tongue in cheek tacky...........but you won't find better music. We saw it in June and loved it. But we all love Queen's Music. All about what you wanna like.

I use http://theatremonkey.com/ to see what the recommended seats are for each show/theatre. The site bills itself as "what theatregoers tell you that box office staff do not."

I would recommend Guys and Dolls. I saw it last year and really enjoyed it. Great dancing and musical numbers. I think Patrick Swayze is in it currently.

Lori - Dirty Dancing opens at the Aldwych Theatre towards the end of October. I have my tickets booked for November!

I recommend Wicked, it is about the plot of the "Wizard of Oz" only from the point of the wicked witch of the West, who turns out not to be so wicked after all!
Also you can try the site www.broadwaybox.com/london , they have discounts for lots of shows in london and maybe you can find new ideas there.
Enjoy

I just found this thread and got ready to add a number of recommendations based on our 10 day stay in late June. But I see KOL's trip is already over.

For others:
Evita and Sunday in the Park with George are both amazing and wonderful current productions I'd highly recommend.

bookmarking

My friend and I absolutely loved Stomp and would highly recommend it. We were told that it would be loud, and it was, but we were up in the first row of the balcony and the noise wasn't uncomfortable at all. We got half-price tickets at the booth in Leicester Square the day of the performance.

Are tickets to "See How They Run?" generally available at the half-price booth in Leicester Sq.?

Yes, they were in June and I see they have been all this week.
See How They Run is indeed a fun show -- dated (World War II) and silly, but so funny and very well done.

My recommendations of Sunday in the Park with George and Evita, sadly are not on discount.

Another show I wish I had seen, but it opened the week after we were there is Canterbury Tales -- it's actually in two parts -- you can see one or both, but as two different performances, and it is on half price at TKTS.

Neopolitan, I am sorry to have missed that. Looks like it was running when we were in London.

Pah. Musicals. Singers that can't act and actors that can't sing.

(Only kidding - Is Chitty Chitty Bang Band still on? Fantastic musical. I've heard Billy Elliott is good too... But wouldn't send any son of mine to see musical theatre)

I'm hoping you aren't serious with any of your comments, Pumbavu, but I'm not sure.

Meanwhile your comment about any son of yours is kind of funny.

Two nights ago on Jeapardy, the final question was the most obvious lyrics from The Impossible Dream and contestants had to identify the musical. The female contestant who was way behind got Man of LaMancha immediately. Both male contestants got it wrong. That'll teach them to have straight men on Jeopardy!