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Posts Tagged "dirty dancing"

1 Sep
2011

London Special Offers: Britain and Ireland’s Next Top Model, Dirty Dancing Theatre Workshops and Fulham FC Tickets

Posted by in London No Comments

Spent too much this summer? We’ve got plenty of money-saving offers to get you through the autumn. Learn to dance like a West End star, get your hands on £1 football tickets and go fashion crazy for a day! Here are our favourite special offers on www.visitlondon.com

Two for One Tickets to Britain and Ireland’s Next Top Model Live: A great offer for a glamorous day out. Fashionista’s won’t want to miss this three-day fashion, beauty and shopping event at ExCel in October.

Two for One Dirty Dancing Theatre Workshops: You’ve seen the film and watched the live show, now it’s time to dance the dance! Pick up a few moves with dance steps and routines set to music from the successful live show (various dates throughout 2011).

Kids’ Premier League Football Tickets for £1: Enjoy a family day out at Craven Cottage as Fulham FC take on Blackburn Rovers. Kids tickets are just £1!

20 Oct
2010

Visit London Asks: Which is your Favourite Vintage Musical?

Posted by in Music, Theatre 2 Comments

Will the vintage musical ever go out of fashion? With their fabulously flirty costumes, the jiving and jitterbugging and the fun tunes, it seems retro shows just keep getting more popular.

My absolute favourite is Grease, which I saw for the third time this week. It is as good as ever, with all the rock’n'roll numbers everyone remembers from the film, and dance routines that are as brilliant as expected from choreographer Arlene Phillips. The cast has recently changed and now features Matthew Goodgame (Channel 4 Musicality, Chicago) as the leader of the T-birds, Danny Zuko and Lauren Samuels (BBC1 Over the Rainbow finalist) making her West End debut as Sandy. Despite tackling some controversial social issues like teenage pregnancy and gang violence, this musical is a fun night out for everyone, and a must-see on the London stage before it goes off on tour in Spring 2011.

Other vintage musicals to see in London:

  • Flashdance: new to the West End stage it tells the tale of 18-year-old Alex, welder by day, “flashdancer” by night, who hopes to be given a place at the Shipley Dance Academy.
  • Dreamboats and Petticoats: a sweet song-writing love story that features many classic songs.
  • Dirty Dancing: brought to the stage after the hit 1987 film about rebellion, growing up pains and above all, the power of dance.
  • Sweet Charity: the story of a dancer-for-hire at a Times Square dance-hall who finds love at last (hurry it ends 6 November).

Why not kit yourself out in the appropriate retro get-up from Rokit in Covent Garden, Portobello Market, Camden Markets or one of the quirky shops on Brick Lane.

What’s your favourite vintage musical in London? Tell us in the comments below…

9 Jul
2010

Moonlight Movies: London’s Outdoor Cinemas

Posted by in Cinema 1 Comment

As the summer weather continues to hold, we at VL Towers are pondering all the lovely things we can do outdoors of an evening. And, following the fun times at the Starlite Urban Drive-In, we can think of nothing better than a visiting one of London’s outdoor or pop-up cinemas.

Here are some of the coolest spots to watch film in London this summer:

Have you spotted any more open air cinema events happening in our fair city? Let us know in the comments below!

12 Feb
2010

Celebrate Chinese New Year in London

Posted by in Kids, Special Events 2 Comments

Noodles, rice, sweet and sour, fireworks, and… tigers?!

What a combination! Strange I know, BUT it’s Chinese New Year: the Year of the Tiger, and it falls on Valentine’s Day, 14 February. Now, I know I’ve already mentioned you should take part in Magic 105.4′s charity Gala Performance of Dirty Dancing on Saturday… so why not go for it this weekend, and join in the Chinese New Year Celebrations on Sunday as well?

If staring into your loved-one’s eyes in the privacy of your own home or over dinner at a romantic London restaurant is top of your list, you can still join in the China Town Association’s celebration on Sunday 21 February. There’ll be an amazing display in Trafalgar Square celebrating the New Year. It’ll be so much fun for the kids. My two daughters are doing a project on Chinese New Year at school, so you know where I’m going to be next Sunday! 

Firecrackers, dragons, lions… the one thing I’m really looking forward to are the Chinese acrobats. They always put on such a spectacular show, full of colour, vibrancy and energy; I can just imagine children wanting to join in the fun.

The great thing about Chinese New Year is that there’s so much for the whole family to do. The two events I’ll be taking my girls to over half term are workshops at the following :

  • National Maritime Museum – arts and crafts workshops making Chinese head dresses, good luck flags and watching performances from the Greenwich Chinese Community School

And

  • Straight after my show on 20 February, I’ll be making my way down to Westfield’s Shopping Centre where the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China, having officially opened the Spring Festival, will be putting on a display of Chinese dance, acrobats, and plays performed by children of Chinese origin

Now, the one thing I haven’t mentioned is food. You can’t celebrate Chinese New Year without having a good Chinese meal! So it’s prawn crackers, chicken in black bean sauce and special fried rice for me, in the heart of Chinatown!

Happy Chinese New Year (and happy half-term) to you all, and let me know what you get up to!

26 Jan
2010

Dirty Dancing Valentine’s Day Charity Gala Performance with Magic 105.4fm

Posted by in Theatre 1 Comment

I don’t know anyone who’s seen the film Dirty Dancing and doesn’t like either the whole movie OR at least one scene, song, or line of the script – agreed?

What about the scene when Baby first sees Johnny Castle walking into Kellerman’s Holiday Camp to start the summer season?

OR

The two classic lines of the film:
“I carried a watermelon” and “Nobody puts baby in a corner.”

My two favourite songs in the film are Cry To Me by Solomon Burke (when they do THAT dance!), and Hey Baby by Bruce Chanel – do you remember Baby and Johnny dancing over the river on the log??  

It’s such a lovely film and will go down in history for so many reasons.

Well, Dirty Dancing is now a musical in its sixth successful year in London’s West End. London’s No 1 radio station Magic 105.4 is hosting a gala performance in time for Valentine’s Day. In fact, it’s on Saturday 13 February at the Aldwych Theatre and all proceeds will go to Cash for Kids – Magic’s chosen charity. 

One of the scenes I’m really looking forward to seeing again when Johnny (Martin Harvey) and Baby (Hannah Vassallo) dance to Solomon Burke’s Cry To Me. The audience generally go wild as the actors and actresses on stage re-produce the scenes from the film verbatim. It’s just like watching a live version of the film!

The character of Penny, played by Nadia Coote is so faithful to the film: with those legs that seem to go on for eternity!

And the soundtrack always has everyone singing along – need I say more? Dirty Dancing is just one of those productions which you find yourself talking about all the way home, and then telling your friends about when you go to school, college or work the following day.

Why not experience it for yourself? Get some friends together and join us for the Gala Performance.

I would also say bring your husband or boyfriend along… For some reason, men are normally in short supply in the audience for this production(!), so twist your hubby’s arm – I’m sure he’ll end up enjoying it too.

21 Jan
2010

Thursday Theatre News: Wicked, Dirty Dancing and National Theatre Excitement

Posted by in Theatre No Comments

In a week dominated by a trip to see Legally Blonde (yes, I’m still humming the songs), there’s nice news from another pair of London musicals.

Wicked has been voted the best musical of the Noughties by visitors to show-and-stay.co.uk, with Spring Awakening and Avenue Q coming in second and third. It’s nice for the Wicked team, but to be honest, I’m not convinced by any poll that has Billy Elliot at No.7 (surely top 3?), and is missing Mamma Mia, Phantom of the Opera and Les Mis.

Next up is Dirty Dancing, which is having a Valentine’s Day Charity Gala on 13 February in aid of Magic 105.4′s Cash for Kids charity. If you’re a fan, make sure you’re there for this special show.

Also this week, the Tricycle Theatre’s announced the third play in their Irish Season. Pat McCabe’s The Dead School joins Greta Garbo Came To Donegal and Chronicles of Long Kesh at the theatre this spring. The Dead School arrives at the Tricycle after a Ireland and a sell-out run at the Ulster Bank Dublin Theatre Festival in 2009, where it was nominated for three Irish Times Theatre Awards including Best Production. If you saw it, tell us about it!

But all the big news today has been about the National Theatre’s new season. And it’s got me breathless with excitement.

There’s Oscar-winner Danny Boyle directing a new take on Frankenstein, and (my personal favourite) Rupert Goold directing a new play by Mike Bartlett about global warming called Earthquakes In London. Shakespeare fans can see a £10 Hamlet with Clare Higgins and Rory Kinnear, directed by Nicholas Hytner, as well as Twelfth Night directed by Peter Hall for his 80th birthday, starring his daughter, film and stage actress Rebecca Hall, as Viola. Wow.

There’s more: I’m personally chuffed to see two shows transferring from my hometown theatres in Northampton: Eugene O’Neill’s Beyond The Horizon and Tennessee Williams’s Spring Storm from the Royal & Derngate Theatres start the new season in April.

Read the whole story of the National Theatre’s 2010 plans on the Official London Theatre website, and put the booking dates in your diaries today! It’s going to be great.

19 Oct
2009

Visit London Asks: What’s Your Favourite London Musical?

Posted by in Theatre 8 Comments

That famous lift in Dirty Dancing The MusicalLast week we set stomachs rumbling and mouths watering with our question about your best London restaurants, in celebration of the London Restaurant Festival. Thanks to everyone who took part.

This week, our attention turns to theatre: namley musicals.

Today is Dirty Dancing The Musical’s birthday! It was three years ago today that the new musical opened at the Aldwych Theatre in London and broke all box office records with advance ticket sales of £11m.

And how is this brilliantly cheesy musical celebrating its 3rd birthday? With even more tickets going on sale! You can now book tickets to see Dirty Dancing right up until October 2010, taking the show up to its fourth birthday.

But Dirty Dancing is actually just like the Baby in the show in West End musical terms: yesterday The Lion King celebrated its 10th birthday. Celebrity guests arrived on a “yellow” carpet at the special 10th anniversary performance at the Lyceum Theatre. You can watch video footage of last night’s 10th anniversary show at the Official London Theatre website.

With both these wonderful shows celebrating success stories, we’d like to open up a debate, often heard in the VL office, to the world outside: what’s your favourite London musical? And why?!

5 Aug
2009

Photo of the Week: Melons Have Time of Their Life in London

Posted by in London, Theatre No Comments

Dirty Dancing fans queue for free tickets

What are this bunch of melons doing queuing up outside the Aldwych Theatre? Trying to get their hands on a free pair of Dirty Dancing tickets apparently.

But why and how you might reasonably ask? Turns out, yesterday was National Watermelon Day and the first hundred people to turn up with one got free tickets. So, what’s the link between tropical fruit and Dirty Dancing? The immortal, “I carried a watermelon” line of course, as uttered by Baby when she first met sexy Johnny Castle (played by Patrick Swayze).

To keep watermelons off this page, please join Visit London’s Flickr Pool and send us your London pics.