The King & I - Palace Theatre, Manchester - Thursday 11th May 2023

This Lincoln Centre production of the Rodgers & Hammerstein classic, The King & I, landed in Manchester this week with elegance, poise and exquisite performances. Read on to learn more about this masterpiece of musical theatre!

Cast

This time around, I'm not going to talk about the story. It's a classic story that's been performed for many years, is a smash hit film and most people know. Instead I want to focus my time on the exceptional cast that graced the stage.

Annalene Beechey leads the cast as Anna Leonowens, the English school teacher hired by the King of Siam to teach his many, many children from many, many wives! A stubborn, intelligent woman that won't bow down to the King's strict rule, Anna learns to love both him and the life in the Palace.

Annalene delivers a truly breathtaking performance from beginning to end. Her voice is sublime with every note sounding like a delight to the ears. Alongside the unbelievable voice, her portrayal of the English school teacher was very much a beautiful development arc showing the relationship grow between her and the country, King and people of Siam. It's a shame that Annalene is only performing in Manchester on this tour, as far as I'm aware.

The difficult, stubborn and also selfish King of Siam was masterfully portrayed by Darren Lee. There was great sense of superiority from the performance which shifted throughout the show as Anna's status matched the level of the King. The comedic moments were great from start to finish and really flipped those more tense moments into light hearted laughing which was definitely needed during the more intense parts of the story.

Other cast members were Cezarah Bonner as Lady Thiang, Sam Jenkins-Shaw as Captain Orton & Edward Ramsay, Dean John-Wilson as Lun The, Caleb Lagayan as Prince Chulalongkorn, Kok-hwa Lie as Kralahome and Marienella Phillips as Tuptim.

All supporting cast members were amazing and there were no standouts as everyone performed as exceptionally as each other.

Special shoutout to the children who performed as the King of Siam's children and as Louis Leonowens. These really are the stars of tomorrow! They also got to have their bow at the end of the show which doesn't always happen!

Set and Production

As with the last Lincoln Centre Production I saw, My Fair Lady, the set was very high quality with the streets of Siam being shown as dark, dingy and busy whereas the Palace was shown as grand, majestic and regal.

The whole production as a whole including the band, the music, the lighting etcetera, etcetera, etcetera... was such high quality it really does show other producers how to produce a show!

Overall

Well... The King & I... Getting to Know You was an emotional and thrilling journey and next time I see you, I'll be sure to ask... Shall We Dance?!

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