Review: Romantic thriller The Bodyguard comes to Sheffield
Posted by: Sam Pegg
All photographs courtesy of Paul Coltas
Exciting, captivating and a whole lot of fun! It’s 5 stars from us
Starring Emily Williams as Rachel Marron and Ayden Callaghan as Frank Farmer, the show was set to be a hit from the outset. Williams is a multi-platinum recording artist and runner up of Network Ten’s Australian Idol back in 2005 and Callaghan played Miles De Souza in Emmerdale and Joe Roscoe on the Channel 4 soap opera Hollyoaks. It’s safe to say, we were pretty excited to see if the show met our expectations… and spoiler, it far exceeded them!
With a run time of around 2 hours and 20 minutes (including a 15 minute interval), there’s plenty of time to be immersed in the stunning music and captivating story.
Based on Lawrence Kasdan’s 1992 Oscar nominated Warner Bros. movie starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner, The Bodyguard is certainly up there as an incredible film, emotional and engaging - but when a theatre show follows a movie there’s always part of us thinking… will it live up to its name? It certainly did! The joys of the theatre are that you enter into the atmosphere of an excited audience of all backgrounds with a similar interest and readiness for the show. Part of the reason we love the theatre so much is that even if you’ve not had the best of days, you leave feeling overjoyed.
Starting with a bang… literally… we are hit by an impeccable performance by pop sensation Rachel Marron with bursts of flames, a live band and colourful lights - if you weren’t in the mood, you certainly were after the first 2 minutes. The Bodyguard featured a whole host of irresistible classics throughout the evening by Whitney Houston including Queen of the Night, So Emotional, One Moment in Time, Saving All My Love, Run to You, I Have Nothing, Greatest Love Of All, Million Dollar Bill, I Wanna Dance With Somebody and one of the greatest hit songs of all time – I Will Always Love You. It’s hard to not join in, but it does make the room for you to be captivated by the performance put on by Williams and the rest of the cast. Don’t worry though, there is a moment for your unleash your burst of excitement to sing at the end.
The plot of the show is very similar to the movie with Former Secret Service agent turned bodyguard, Frank Farmer, hired to protect superstar Rachel Marron from an unknown stalker. Each expects to be in charge; what they don’t expect is to fall in love.
I don’t think I could write enough times in this review just how incredible the voices of those who sang were and it’s crucial to mention Emily-Mae who played Nicki Marron (the sister of Rachel) as her voice was truly stunning also and deserves a mention in itself. The acting from the full cast was faultless and special mention to Ryo Appadu who played Fletcher, as his acting skills were amazing for such a young age. The staging was simple but effective with as little as a sofa in some scenes, lighting that created both moving and exciting moments and a scene in the cabin which was well put together. Not to forget the use of projections showing scenes of the stalker (played by Marios Nicolaides) which was something we hadn’t seen done before.
As the night went on, you didn’t want it to come to an end - the songs kept coming, you became increasingly invested into the relationship between the family and Frank Farmer. But when it did finally get to the finale it did not disappoint with a standing ovation, singing and dancing! We would HIGHLY recommend booking to see this show.
The Bodyguard comes to the Lyceum Theatre from Tuesday 10 - Saturday 14 October. Tickets can be booked through the Box Office in person, over the phone on 0114 249 6000, or at sheffieldtheatres.co.uk
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