Skip to main content

Review of The Addams Family Musical: School Edition (Team Thing) at the Cripps Hall Theatre, Northampton

This weekend I found myself back at Cripps Hall Theatre to see the alternate cast performance of The Addams Family Musical, and it was every bit as entertaining as the first. For my Team Cousin IT review click here, but for now, let us talk about Team Thing.

Leading the cast in this version was Ben Mineards, and he presented an accomplished performance bringing a delightful physicality to the role of the head of the house Gomez and dealt some brilliant comic timing. Eleanor Butt played with a slick deadpan nature his wife Morticia, and I have to say her vocal skills extremely impressed me. Her singing was strong, confident and was one of the strongest singers across both productions.

I really enjoyed both Violet Clarke as Wednesday and Mia Leader as Pugsley. They provided great humour and worked excellent as the sibling partnership. Robson Scott meanwhile was a delightfully enthusiastic performer as Uncle Fester and had great charm which helped in this characters role as the narrator of the show as well.

Jacob Luck provided great lurking presence as Lurch, and his shinning moment was an excellent moment of remaining in character and delivering that nice unexpected moment in the second act.

While I didn’t refer to the production itself in great detail in my first review, here I must comment on the excellent direction of the piece from Katy Batchelor, keeping so many youngsters in check, while maintaining control on stage, I imagine it not a small feat.

Also, the excellent and clear choreography from Fiona Luck brought more visible control on stage, and showed the huge talent and dedication from the young performers. Finally, Rod Iliffe as musical director brought excellent music to the shows with the ten strong orchestra.

Both teams on The Addams Family Musical did the NMTC Youth Society proud and provided two excellent days of entertainment.

Fun entertaining, and deliciously dark comic fun.
⭐⭐⭐½


Performance reviewed: Sunday 10th April 2022 (matinee) at the Cripps Hall Theatre, Northampton.

The Addams Family: School Edition ran  until Sunday 10th April at the Cripps Hall Theatre and details of the group can be found at https://www.northamptonmusicaltheatrecompany.co.uk/youth/

The Addams Family is an NMTC YOUTH SOCIETY PRODUCTION

Production photos: Ashleigh Standage


Popular posts from this blog

Review of Inspector Morse: House of Ghosts at Milton Keynes Theatre

The intellectually leaning Inspector Morse first appeared in print in the works of Colin Dexter in 1975 and became even more prominent in popular culture in 1987 when John Thaw took on the role in a series that would run for fourteen years. As well as generating a couple of spin-off TV series, Melting Pot and Birmingham Rep have now finally taken the detective to the stage in Inspector Morse: House of Ghosts , an original story written by TV series contributor Alma Cullen. So, as the play arrives at Milton Keynes Theatre this week with Tom Chambers now taking the eponymous role, does the Oxford intellectual make a smooth transition to the stage? Our story opens with Morse enjoying a stage production of Hamlet with a would-be love interest, Ellen. As expected, things quickly turn towards the need for a detective in the house as one of the players mysteriously collapses and dies live on stage. House of Ghosts opens excellently, drawing the audience in as a classic Hamlet scene suddenly ...
Read more

Review of Friends - The Musical Parody at Milton Keynes Theatre

The One Where 2026 starts in a world of confusion. And so, 2026 is upon us and for my first trip to the theatre this year, one of my most significant reviewing challenges was to occur. Touring to Milton Keynes Theatre is Friends - The Musical Parody , based, unsurprisingly, on that little American show that ran to a few audience members for ten years. However, I confess that I was not, and have never been in that audience, never having seen a single episode of the show. However, always up for a review challenge and doing my due diligence by having a Friends superfan as my plus one, I headed to Milton Keynes with anticipation. For those unfamiliar with the show, I could say I can’t help; however, a quick review of some of the information you might need (thanks, Google and my plus one). Running for ten years between 1994 and 2004 with 236 episodes (quiz question, you are welcome), the main characters consisted of Phoebe (ditzy, writer of sad songs), Monica (in possession of an unfeasibly...
Read more

Review of The All New Adventures of Peter Pan at Royal & Derngate (Derngate), Northampton

For theatres across the land, it's that time of year again. The time when the theatres fill with screaming children and a ridiculous amount of sugar intake and trips to the toilet. Yes, it is panto time, and before you say it, oh yes it is. This year, for the Royal & Derngate, it is time for a trip to Neverland (or Forever Land, that is, but more on that later) and a magical adventure with Peter Pan and the dastardly Captain Hook. Once again, following hugely successful previous runs, Evolution Productions brings this tale to the stage in 2025. And it has to be said, once again, they strike panto gold with The All New Adventures of Peter Pan , with a constantly lively, brilliantly colourful and awkwardly funny production that, as always with Evolution, is totally family friendly. Over the years here, Evolution and writer Paul Hendy have created the essence of pantomime (which just so happens to link to the tale within this story). Keeping all the traditions intact, a ghostly be...
Read more