Death Note The Musical
We now return you to this blog's real topic: reviews of contemporary musical theatre.
I have been to see Death Note The Musical at the Barbican.
I had no idea what to expect. I wasn't sure if Death Note's ultra-dark, uncompromising high-stakes intellectual cat-and-mouse games set in a morally grey universe would really lend themselves to, you know, show tunes.
Also, I had never seen a musical before.
As it was, I enjoyed the hell out of it, to such an extent in fact that it's a little difficult to talk about. Bad writing and filmmaking are fertile ground for instructive criticism; I would happily talk to you about Gladiator until the cows come home, but here I find that I would rather say too little than too much, especially since it was such a pleasant surprise.
I will say that I was impressed by how Paolo Montalban as Yagami Sr. is the spitting image of every Japanese character actor who has ever played a senior detective in a TV drama, down to the exact glasses and hairstyle. The effect is so strong that I'm convinced it must be deliberate.
The costumes are a mix of highly accurate to the source material and complete reinterpretations. There were some girls in the audience who nailed the original Misa look.
I sat in row L, which amused me.