’30 YEARS OF STANDING OVATIONS’ trumpeted the huge video screen at Oxford’s New Theatre, shortly before the cheeky, glittering Little Spirit pranced on stage to begin the show.
Welcome to the 30th anniversary tour of Lord Of The Dance, Michael Flatley’s well-oiled juggernaut of a dance show: loud, unsubtle, slick and utterly riveting.
‘It’s like watching a sleight-of-hand card-trick performed over and over: you watch intently but you still can’t fathom how they do it’
Either side of our merch-securing opportunity, we enjoyed an hour of totally mesmerising fantasy sequences during which the good-guys of the forest, led by The Lord and his love-interest Saoirse, are accosted by the baddies: The Dark Lord, his Warlords and Morrighan the Temptress. The screen displays luscious green woodland imagery for the former, and flames, molten lava and ruined temples for the latter.
This is an exceptionally well-paced show where thunderously loud and fast dance/fight routines are followed by slow tenderly sung ballads, which in turn lead to two ladies dashing around, sawing away at their Irish fiddles – all tremendous fun.
‘There’s a reason 60 million of us have seen this show since it debuted in 1998 and it is, of course, the dancing’
The stunning, ever-changing costumes and pulsating Celtic tinged music are the perfect platform for what we’re all really here to see. There’s a reason 60 million of us have seen this show since it debuted in 1998 and it is, of course, the dancing.
No YouTube video will ever convey how incredible it is; you must see it performed live in front of you. And hear it, because the true magic is created by the blur of legs and feet combined with the syncopated clattering of their ‘jig’ shoes.
‘the true magic is created by the blur of legs and feet combined with the syncopated clattering of their ‘jig’ shoes’
It’s like watching a sleight-of-hand card-trick performed over and over: you watch intently but you still can’t fathom how they do it and you just have to revert to your default position (for this show) of child-like wonder.
After two exhilarating hours, the hunky guys and gorgeous girls have beaten the clad-in-black, wonderfully camp Warlords and all is well in the world again. Staggeringly, nobody on the stage appears out of breath but I certainly am. I somehow managed to resist the allure of the merch stall, but I gladly gave them their standing ovation.
EDWARD BLISS
MICHAEL FLATLEY’S LORD OF THE DANCE runs at New Theatre Oxford until Sunday July 12. To book, please visit: https://www.atgtickets.com/shows/lord-of-the-dance-30th-anniversary/new-theatre-oxford/
