LES MISERABLE

The first musical show of mine goes to the classic of all time [Les Miserable] aka les mis.

Squeezing the stage show into our London trip is a bit hectic, anyway we have did so because we are in London right? We have chosen the Queens theatre London near to the Chinatown. The show starts at 7.30 and the advance booking required us to collect the ticket half an hour earlier, which is around 7pm. After grabbing some sandwich and drink, we then enter the theatre. (We finish the sandwhich and drink before going in as the theatre doesn't allow outside food)

A little surprise

This is the first time I enter a theatre house and the seating arrangement has caught myself a little surprise.
Unlike the cinema, the seats from one row to another are so steep, and because we have selected the cheapest tickets (45 pound), we are sitting very high up and distantly far from the stage. The view is like a drone view with 60 degree angle.

Embarrassing moment

The show is split into two 1.5 hours sessions with 10 minutes break in between. Without checking this out earlier, we have made a silly mistake. We thought the show has ended during the first half and wanted to exit the theater until the staff reminded us to get back to the seat haha..

The summary

The plot set off from a small town in southern France , Tou Lon, Take place at 1815.
Always mistakenly confused by people with the French Revolution timeline, the narration is actually setting after French Revolution.
The story is surrounding a prisoner Jean valjean who Released from uncommitted charge after 19 years of services in the jail. After being helped by a kind bishop, he swore to restart his life.
In just few years of time in a new town Montreuil-sur-mer, Jean Valjean became a successful town Mayor with a masked identity as Madeleine. This is where he met with Fantine, a woman who sacrifice herself as a prostitute to earn a living for her daughter. Fantine died after fallen ill and before she died, Jean valjean has promised to take care of her daughter, Cosette.
By keeping his promise, Jean found and bought Cosette from a family and continued to be his step father after that. Cossete grown up and fell in love with a young man, Marius during the war time. From opposing to the relationship at the beginning, protective Valjean rescued Marius from the barricades and finally agreed Cosette to marry to him.
Valjean then confess to Marius about his criminal past. Worrying of being involved in the criminals, Marius tries to prevent Cosette away from his father. However, the two eventually reunion before Valjean pass away.

All the side connection sum up

The fascinating thing of the story is besides than the main plot, there are actually some side connections of other characters with Valjean, which evolved together with the story line. For an instance, the catch me if you can relationship with the police chief, Javert. You can feel the struggling when Javert has the chance to catch Valjean again, but refused to do so because of paying the return of Valjean's help him once. And the amusing husband and wife who characterize the greedy humanity part of the story, turn out to be beggar.

Interesting yet educational

I can't agree more that the story itself is not only interesting yet it is educational at the same time. There are many more morals of the story that we could learn from it, which really need you to watch the show to understand.

Res and Black is my favorite song

I knew the songs of les mis before the story. A year ago, I have downloaded the les mis album and my favorite songs are [Red and Black], [Do you hear the people sing], [Bring him home].
After watching the shows, I understand the songs better and basically love all of them.

Great performer is the key

As a first-timer, I couldn't believe myself would enjoy the stage performance, smoothly, without feeling a little bit of boredom. While I couldn't fully pick up every single line of the dialogue, I have no problem in understanding the story. This has to credit to the professional performers as well as the stage setting artists.

So what's is your favorite show??