Wednesday the 11th of April saw two events take take place; firstly, it was my birthday, and secondly it was the opening night of the new run of Cappuccino Girls which is the musical theatre show written by Mal Pope a few years back. Rigging the ‘theatre’ (originally a generic building on Swansea high street) has been a long haul for a lot of dedicated, hard-working people so it was great to finally get there and open the door to the public. My part in it was the design and installation of the sound system but every aspect from painting the walls to making the stage clothes has had to be dealt with and, as I said, a lot of people have put a lot of time, effort and faith into it.
The dress rehearsal went almost flawlessly, with a few director’s notes to take on board, and the evening performance was a treat. This is a ‘girly flick’, not Ben Hur, but there is some superb acting going on and there are a couple of moments which will make most people cry as a consequence of some performing that is quite frankly world-class – I don’t say that lightly!
Mal’s skill as a composer and lyricist also play no small part.
OK – it was the first night so there was an enthusiastic crowd, but the show still had to work well and it did. There have been some rave emails sent and everyone’s feeling very proud of a job well done.
The great thing from my point of view is that it’s a musical theatre show that was all done on a tight budget…which of course is impossible. The lighting, sound and set has all been achieved with ‘inadequate’ equipment and an ‘inadequate’ number of personnel because – and here’s the clever bit – no-one wasted time on ridiculous luvvy palaver or theatre bollocks; we just got on with the job. The show looks great, sounds great, is selling tickets and making enough profit to keep everyone in a job and, as yet, no-one has asked what brand the speakers are…any questions?
