Shrek!!

In the long running, and well I guess seemingly never ending process of making movies out of plays and plays out of movies, we took a bit of a leap and went to see Shrek. Its one thing to take a movie with humans and a somewhat 'normal' plot and setting and turn it into a play/musical, but I wasn't so sure just how they were going to pull it off with fairytales and annimation.

Kristen works pretty much in the center of the theatre district so it makes it easy to stumble across tickets. Turns out that what we thought was the best course of action.....go to the half price tickets shop first thing in the morning might not have actually been all that great. Kristen just walked right up to the box office early afternoon, and low and behold front row center.

So we arrive a the Royal Theatre Drury Lane, home to Miss Saigon for 4,263 performances in a row from 1989-1999. (Pretty incredible to think that they can essentially do the exact same thing night after night and keep selling out, or at least making good money at it) The old theatres are easily one of my favorite parts. This building has been standing since 1812, and is essentially the same as it was after renovation in 1922. In general 1. they are just cool, 2. you get to sit super close, really no matter where your seats are, 3) the just 'feel' better, like you could be having the exact experience that someone had 50 or 100 years ago. Albeit there was no Shrek back then, but maybe we will go see something really old, and then it will be exactly the same.

The show was really good, I am a big fan of animated movies, so I think I might have built it up too, much, afterall it was a play and there is only so much you can do. Makes me think what the world might be like in 50 or 100 years, when everything is 3D and CGI, will actors even exist much less plays and musicals. Anyway, I give them alot of credit for the production, I can imagine from 15 or so rows back it was fantastic. With all the makeup and costumes and such being on the front row was a bit like getting to see the sausage being made. We were so close that you could see the little things that they worked so hard to hide. I am nitpicking for sure, but just an observation.

Best part hands down was the guy who played Lord Farqaad ruler of Duloc. In the movie he is just really short, but in the play, he had to do everything from his knees. Imagine it as Dwarf on acting.

I do however resent that fact that their songs are so damn catchy that i find myself singing them pretty regularly now. I even think Kristen was a fan despite what I anticipate was a fair bit of trepidation going into it.