We have asked Musical Theatre Review’s brilliantly talented team of expert critics, based across the UK, to name one particular show that made the biggest impression on them during the last 12 months.
Tag Archives | Merrily We Roll Along
Movie Review – Merrily We Roll Along Broadway production
Merrily We Roll Along was filmed at the Hudson Theatre, New York in June 2024. The movie played in selected UK cinemas from 5 December 2025. Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ It’s special and not to be missed.
Five Questions With: Julian Ovenden
Olivier Award-nominated actor and singer Julian Ovenden is setting off on a Cathedral Tour in January 2026.
Associated Studios – Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along was performed by Associated Studios students at the Playground Theatre, London. Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ There’s something particularly moving about watching this back-to-front musical played by young people.
Music Review: Merrily We Roll Along – New Broadway Cast Recording
Merrily We Roll Along – New Broadway Cast Recording (Masterworks Broadway). The joy of recordings such as this – with its A-list leads – is its wider appeal than perhaps the typical cast album. Merrily We Roll Along – New Broadway Cast Recording (Masterworks Broadway). Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
The Outsiders is named Best Musical at the 77th Tony Awards, Suffs wins Best Book and Score, while Merry We Roll Along and Hell’s Kitchen pick up the acting honours
The Outsiders was crowned Best Musical at the 77th Tony Awards. The musical version of SE Hinton’s 1967 novel and Francis Ford Coppola’s cult 1983 film fought off stiff opposition from Alicia Keys’ semi-autobiographical Hell’s Kitchen (featuring a book by Kristoffer Diaz and musical and lyrics by Keys).
Alicia Keys musical Hell’s Kitchen and music drama Stereophonic lead Tony Award nominations
The Alicia Keys musical Hell’s Kitchen and the music drama Stereophonic, set in the 1970s, came out on top in the recently announced Tony Award nominations, both recognised 13 times.
National Youth Music Theatre – Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along was performed by the National Youth Music Theatre at the Southwark Playhouse Elephant, London. Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
World premiere and two classic musicals to feature in NYMT’s summer season
The world premiere of the stage musical adaptation of Lara Williamson’s best-selling novel The Boy Who Sailed The Ocean In An Armchair is one of three major musical productions to feature in the National Youth Music Theatre’s (NYMT) summer season.
Musical Theatre Review contributors pick their top shows of 2022
A selection of Musical Theatre Review critics were asked to choose their ‘show of the year’ although, as you can see, some struggled to pick just one.
Royal Academy of Music – Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along at the Susie Sainsbury Theatre, Royal Academy of Music, London. Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ It’s some coincidence that Stephen Sondheim’s two big Broadway flops, Anyone Can Whistle and Merrily We Roll Along, should pitch up in brilliantly innovative London revivals within weeks of each other. Whistle, beset […]
Remembering Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021), The Ultimate Musical Man of Broadway
Stephen Sondheim rewrote the history of the Broadway musical in a career lasting over 60 years. Michael Darvell looks back, show by show, at the genius that was Stephen Sondheim. It is an unquestionable fact that Stephen Sondheim was responsible for taking the rather moribund genre of the Broadway musical and breathing new life into […]
‘There are giants in the sky’: The theatre community pays tribute to Stephen Sondheim
It feels pretty impossible to find the words to sum up the kind of influence composer Stephen Sondheim had on the world of musical theatre. There was of course the way he turned the genre on its head and made changes to form and content that had never been contemplated before. Then there was the […]
‘We are all blessed to have been alive at the same time as this theatre legend’: Stephen Sondheim dies at the age of 91
The Stephen Sondheim Society’s Chairman and Musical Theatre Review contributor Craig Glenday writes: Dim the lights… Stephen Sondheim was the most innovative, most influential and most important composer and lyricist in modern Broadway history. His contribution to musical theatre – and to theatre in general – is impossible to quantify, such was the variety, sophistication […]
Watch: The non-stop rise of Lin-Manuel Miranda
On Friday 3 July 2020, the film of Hamilton will be made available to stream on Disney Plus, giving millions the opportunity to see the show from the comfort of their own homes for the very first time. To celebrate the occasion, here is a brief history of writer/star Lin-Manuel Miranda’s remarkable career to date: […]
A Crossword of Sondheimian Rhyme
Stephen Sondheim is probably theatre’s greatest living lyricist. This is a compliment he may or may not be sick of reading, especially after last month’s deluge of well-deserved 90th birthday encomiums. Either way, as a (somewhat less-acclaimed) musical theatre maker myself I know there is something every proud lyricist could never tire of: people noticing […]
Sondheim at 90: A YouTube career retrospective
Ian Bowkett writes: It is deeply unfortunate that on the 90th birthday of legendary composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim we are in the midst of a period without access to live musical theatre. However, that does make this the perfect time to scour YouTube for our favourite renditions of his songs to take us away to happier […]
Guildhall School of Music and Drama – Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along, performed by students from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, continues at the Silk Street Theatre, London until 10 July 2019. Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩ Merrily We Roll Along is such a fabulous musical with its fascinating back -to-front story and some of Stephen Sondheim’s […]
INTERVIEW: Composer & musical director Glyn Kerslake brings The Nightmare Before Christmas back to Salisbury Playhouse
Lesley Bates writes: When it comes to Christmas, Salisbury has a special place in GLYN KERSLAKE’s heart. For the past seven years or so, the West End veteran has become a regular fixture at Salisbury Playhouse over the festive season, either as performer or musical director or both, usually for the musically-themed revues offered by […]
Interview – Josefina Gabrielle on the pleasure of playing her latest Sondheim role in A Little Night Music
JOSEFINA GABRIELLE is playing Desiree Armfeldt in A Little Night Music, currently playing at the Watermill Theatre in Bagnor, near Newbury. Josefina is no stranger to Sondheim’s musical style – she has played Gussie Carnagie in Merrily We Roll Along (Menier Chocolate Factory) and Dot/Marie in Sunday in the Park With George (Leicester Haymarket). Her extensive musical theatre credits also […]
Performance Preparation Academy – Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along was performed by Performance Preparation Academy at the Bellerby Studio Theatre, Guildford. Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩ It’s quite a coincidence that the two biggest flops of Stephen Sondheim’s career are being revisited at the same time with Anyone Can Whistle, which lasted nine performances on Broadway […]
Interview – Julian Ovenden on new album Be My Love – and being struck by lightning
From Broadway to the West End, to the dappled light of Downton Abbey, JULIAN OVENDEN has been delighting audiences with acting and song since the age of seven (starting as a choir boy at St Paul’s Cathedral). Twenty years and a hugely varied career later, he releases his second solo album, Be My Love, a smooth […]
Our Time – KT Sullivan and Jeff Harnar Sing Sondheim – Crazy Coqs
Our Time: KT Sullivan and Jeff Harnar Sing Sondheim at the Crazy Coqs, London continues until 14 February. Star rating: 4 stars **** Put two of New York’s finest, most enduring cabaret performers in the best room in town, give them 20 of Stephen Sondheim’s cleverest songs to interpret, many with a new, gender-bending twist, and the result, as you might […]
Interview – Maria Friedman celebrates New Year’s Eve with special musicals gala
It’s an understatement to say that Olivier Award-winning actress and director MARIA FRIEDMAN is busy. Along with performing her acclaimed cabaret shows and making plans to stage the Cole Porter musical High Society at the Old Vic next year, she is regularly filming BBC1’s EastEnders (playing the character of Elaine Peacock). So one would imagine that […]
Maria Friedman will direct High Society at the Old Vic
Multi-award-winning director and actress Maria Friedman will direct an in the round production of Cole Porter’s classic musical High Society at the Old Vic, previewing from 30 April 2015 and running until 22 August (press night is 14 May). High Society is, of course, based on The Philadelphia Story by Philip Barry and the 1956 MGM film musical starring Bing […]
Merrily We Roll Along – London College of Music
Merrily We Roll Along was performed by the London College of Music BA Musical Theatre students at Watermans Arts Centre, Brentford. From way down the Sondheim pecking order, well behind Follies, Sweeney Todd, A Little Night Music and Company in the eyes of most, Merrily We Roll Along has emerged over the past two years as […]
The Book of Mormon wins big at Olivier Awards
The Book Of Mormon dominated the musical categories at the 38th Olivier Awards with MasterCard, winning four prizes including Best New Musical and Best Actor in a Musical for Gavin Creel (that’s four wins from six nominations). Les Misérables won the much-coveted BBC Radio 2 Audience Award for the second time. The ceremony at London’s Royal Opera […]
Charlie and Merrily top Olivier Awards nominations
New musical Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along have topped the voting in the Olivier Awards 2014 nominations, as announced by previous winners Nigel Harman and Leigh Zimmerman in London today. Best New Musical nominees Once, The Book of Mormon and The Scottsboro Boys are hot on their heels with six nominations. The highly […]
Liz Callaway – Crazy Coqs
An Evening with Liz Callaway at the Crazy Coqs, London, continues until 1 February. Just when everybody thought the evening was going like clockwork, Broadway star Liz Callaway ‘forgot’ her lines in the ridiculously fast ‘Another 100 People’ and had the first night Crazy Coqs audience gasping in surprise and sympathy as the Sondheim classic […]
Candide – Menier Chocolate Factory
Candide continues at the Menier Chocolate Factory, London, until 22 February 2014. Menier Chocolate Factory’s last musical Merrily We Roll Along was a huge hit, even transferring for a successful run in the West End and being made into a movie, but it is hard to be as enthusiastic about the theatre’s revival of Candide. […]
Criswell, Henshall, Friedman at Cadogan Hall
Jeremy Chapman previews From West End to Broadway, a trio of concerts at London’s Cadogan Hall. The glorious voice of Kim Criswell launches an August series of Thursday treats for musical theatre aficionados at the Cadogan Hall, London, on 1 August. An honorary Brit after marrying one and settling here shortly after playing the title role […]
