London: Les Miserables

(Written the night of the show, May 21, 2010, from my hostel in London)

Tonight Gracie and I went to go fulfill another lifelong dream of mine: seeing Les Miserables in the West End and it did not disappoint.

We had a long day getting to London and doing some sightseeing, so before going to the three hour long show Grace and I snuck in a little nap. After resting we got all dolled up to go to the theatre, Grace wearing her cute little coral coloured dress and me in my black Ann Taylor dress. After all, going to the theatre is all about the experience and dressing up is part of that.

Another part of that is getting dinner beforehand. While walking over to Piccadilly Circus we saw a Thai restaurant that had a deal for a three course "Pre-Theatre" meal for 15 GBP so we stopped in there. The food was very good (amazing Pad Thai) and we got a lot of it too. I, of course, was very stressed* that we would not get to the show in time but my fears proved to be unfounded.

We got to the theatre and I squealed a lot, as I do when I get excited. When people asked me what I wanted to do when I went abroad I told them that the only thing that I had to do was see Les Miz in the West End and here I was standing in front of the Queen's Theatre with my ticket in hand.

A very excited me

Fulfilling dreams is fun!

We got in a took our seats in the upper circle, row J, which was not necessarily close to the action but also not a bad view. And the the show started.

• I loved the set and how it rotated around and the way that it was used. Very cool. I'm sure it would have been even cooler seeing it from more of a ground level. Being up so high we did see a couple of characters that should have been dead come back to life, drink some water, fix their hair, and then die again.
• "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables" was a tearjerker, as was Fantine's death scene and the ending.
• The actors had amazing voices (I would expect no less). The actors playing Eponine, Jean Valjean, and Enjolras were especially talented.
• Little Cosette was adorable!
• I thought I would cry a lot more. Maybe it was because I was already familiar with the story.

Afterwards we took a black cab home which just added to the phenominal London experience. Seriously, my life could not get any better when I was riding in a black cab coming home from Les Miserables in the West End wearing a cocktail dress with my little sister.

*Throughout the entire trip I was stressed but luckily I had Grace there to calm me down and remind me that sometimes you just need to take it easy.