Thumbnail Image

Let's talk about musical theatre

Alison T.

I’ve always loved musicals. When I was in junior school, I used to run across the playing field, pretending to be Maria von Trapp (Julie Andrews) singing ‘The Sound of Music’. I knew all the words to ‘The Sound of Music’, ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’, ‘Doctor Doolittle’, and ‘Mary Poppins’.

During my 20 years in Korea, I mistakenly thought that Korean musicals wouldn’t be of a good quality so I never went to see them. It wasn’t until I returned to England that I discovered how wrong I had been. I bought a copy of the DVD of Miss Saigon in London 2014/15. I was stunned by the emotion in the scene where Thuy tries to kill Tam. I’d never seen anything like it in a musical before. So, I looked up the actor playing Thuy and discovered it was Kwang-ho Hong (홍광호). I soon discovered he has the best singing voice I’ve ever heard. I also discovered that, these days, Korea produces musicals of the highest quality.

If I were still in Korea now, I would be trying to get a ticket for Jekyll and Hyde, which starts next week at the Blue Square Theatre. My preference would be to see Kwang-ho Hong (홍광호) as Jekyll/Hyde and Gong-ju Yoon (윤공주) as Lucy.

The Great Gatsby, a Korean-produced musical is scheduled to open in London next year, and I plan to see it. Can’t wait!

Added to Saved

This column was published by the author in their personal capacity.
The opinions expressed in this column are the author's own and do not reflect the view of Cafetalk.

Lesson

Let's talk about musicals

20 min
1,000 Points

Comments (0)

Login to Comment Log in »
Recommend ribbon

from:

in:

Lesson Categories

Language Fluency

English   Native
Korean   Daily conversation

Alison T.'s Most Popular Columns

« Back to List of Tutor's Column
Got a question? Click to Chat