I was lucky enough to win tickets in Aladdin’s lottery for the matinee on the 15th of August! Let us dive into this wonderful Disney musical head first.
As I mentioned I was extremely lucky to win £20 tickets to Aladdin on the 15th of August which was the day after we came back from Paris. We booked a last-minute hotel and confirmed the tickets. As it was the first day back in London after a busy couple days in Paris, I was shattered and didn’t overly know what to expect from this Disney musical, but wow, I LOVED it!! It was WAY better than I was expecting it to be!!
Cast
First up I have to talk about Matthew Croke who plays Aladdin! He was amazing! Perfect for the role! I knew he was gonna be great from the minute he started singing One Jump Ahead – one of my personal favourites from the soundtrack- the energy and happiness just radiated off him throughout the musical!
I also loved him in the well known A Whole New World as well as one of the new songs written for the stage musical called Proud of your Boy.
On top of being a great singer, he was also an incredible dancer- when there were big group dance numbers, I found myself still focused on him. I loved his scenes with Trevor (Genie) as well as his scenes with Courtney (Jasmine) and Oliver, Daniel and Julian (Aladdin’s friends Babkak, Omar and Kassim); whoever he was opposite in the scene he did a great job with. He was the perfect Aladdin and I can’t wait to see what he goes on to do after Aladdin closes.
Next up is Trevor Dion Nicholas who played the fabulous Genie! I love Trevor in this role! He was hilarious! I saw him perform with Matthew back in May at ‘Magic at the Musicals’ where they sang Somebody’s Got Your Back from the show. Whilst I thought it was a good performance I didn’t understand the context of it within the musical but with the context I loved it! Trevor’s Genie was so funny! He made me laugh so much! He worked so well with Matthew and you could feel their friendship radiating off of them. Let me just say Trevor has some PIPES! His version of Prince Ali was amazing and made me smile throughout but as grand as that number was, NOTHING can beat Friend Like Me! That scene was spectacular! It was like the cartoon version but obviously on a stage show! The amount of work and hours that must go into nailing that number is beyond me. Trevor’s performance in FLM was amazing! Probably my favourite from the entire show! He was perfect as the Genie! Couldn’t imagine anyone else in the role! I’m keeping my fingers crossed that he’ll be in the recorded film version.
Next up is Courtney Reed who played Princess Jasmine. If you didn’t know Courtney was the girl who originated the role of Jasmine on Broadway back in 2011- which is pretty cool!
Jasmine was one of my favourite princesses as a kid (even had a Jasmine costume 😂 ). So I always like seeing portrayals of her character. Courtney was no exception! Knowing she was the OG Jasmine made me think she was gonna be great but I didn’t know how great but wow! I loved her! Her soft but strong vocals were perfect for Jasmine; In this
Next up is Ivan De Freitas and Mitch Leow two great understudies who played Jafar and Iago! I really enjoyed these two together, they we’re great at being the evil Disney villians. I loved the new song called Diamond in the Rough that the musical gave them as well. I thought that Ivan did a great job at portraying Jafar and his portrayal reminded me of the 1992 animated version; Mitch was also a great Iago to go along with Ivan’s Jafar. The only thing that shocked me was the fact they didn’t have much stage time compared to both films!
Moving onto Oliver Lidert, Julian Capolei and Daniel De Bourg as Aladdin’s friends Babkak, Omar and Kassim.
This trio was so fun to watch on stage, it wasn’t until I got to half time I realized that they were replacing Abu 😂. I loved their song with Matthew – Babkak, Omar, Aladdin Kassim – which again was a new one for the musical; it was filled with them all doing great dancing – the smiles they had during that number were infectious and you just knew they were having a great time on stage.
Lastly, I have to mention Irvine Iqbal as Sultan….whilst he wasn’t on stage for long I still enjoyed his scenes and father/daughter bond with Courtney.
Stand-out Moments
As I said this musical was far better than I was expecting! Here are my 2 main stand out moments!!
Friend like me: Everything about this section of the musical was amazing! I would pay £20 just to see that one scene! The set (pictured above) was AMAZING! The details and extravagant props were stunning and just added to the epic-ness of this musical and that’s before we have Trevor belting out Friend Like Me. There were firework type sparklers going off at the climax and it was just amazing to see!
Next was A Whole New World; who doesn’t love this romantic Disney duet? Matthew and Courtney’s voices complimented each other so well which made me love the duet but on top of that THERE WAS AN ACTUAL FLYING CARPET, now I know magic doesn’t exist but I have no idea how they did it!! I couldn’t see any wires or anything that was visibly making it move…which made this extra special to see!
Seats
As we won the loterry for the seats we didn’t have a say of where we sat, they put us in row O and the last two seats on the left hand side, we felt that these seats would be quite far back but they were much closer than we thought they’d be, we didn’t miss anything!
Overall
Overall I LOVED this musical! It was WAY better than I would ever think it to be! I am so glad I got to see it before it closes on the 24th of August; although I’m wishing I had seen it earlier so I could see it again! It is up there with Phantom of the Opera in regards to being visually spectacular and incredible!
If you want to buy a recording of the show to listen to you can do so here;
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