The phrase that best captures my experience with the UK/Ireland tour (henceforth "The Tour") is
"uniformly excellent". There are two parts to that phrase and I will start with the second.
Excellent reflects a
very high bar of quality that The Tour has achieved, the highest in my opinion for my experiences across Broadway, the North American Tour and multiple US Regionals. I saw two shows on the West End, years apart, so I don't feel qualified to assess that production. Seemed to me that the NA Tour took the Broadway show to another level, refining it further and improving it in a lot of ways. The Tour now goes beyond that. It stands in contrast to US regionals where the name of the game is how can the show be simplified and (hopefully) retain the essence of BETM. On The Tour the challenge remains pushing Billys as far as they can go. It is a showcase of the
jaw-droppingly amazing things a 12-year-old can do, demanding high levels of all the forms of dance that are utilized in BETM and being willing to put Billy at risk, such as doing the flip off the piano. With regionals, there are explanations of how 12-year-old pre-RBS Billy is not supposed to be "fully formed, leapt from the brow of Zeus". Well, on The Tour, they are, and they make no apologies for it.
There is a positive aspect of "uniformly" but also a slightly negative one, albeit primarily for us BETM veterans doing Billy-thons. It seems that just about every detail of the Billy performance is scripted. Every gesture, reaction even expression is very similar across the three Billys I got to see. To my eye, it is a culmination of all the best things that worked well for the many predecessor Billys and produces a fine characterization overall. This underscores the incredible attention to every last detail that goes into Billy training for The Tour. Extending even to the length of dramatic pauses and there are a lot of those, seeing as this show runs 3 hours and 5 minutes quite consistently. Are all those pauses necessary? Probably not, but most of them are better to have than rushing through.
However on some level, this uniformity produces some loss of individuality, ironically. On the NA tour, we learned which Billy did certain moves and reacted certain ways and it was interesting to see the styles in one Billy-thon. There was some variety across the Michaels, curiously enough, but less so across Billys.
I have three examples that capture both aspects of "uniformly excellent". First is the rope skipping. Through the Broadway run and NA tour, all the Billys would skip rope, but it was only certain Billys that learned to do cross-overs. Many regionals eliminate rope skipping altogether or keep it slow. On the UK tour, all the Billys skip rope, attempt crossovers and do so at
fast speed. The success rate is not 100% of course, but when it does happen perfectly, WOW is it impressive!
Second is the overall choreography that is excellent and uniformly so. For a bit of brevity, this discussion will focus on
Electricity. Whereas previously some Billies did aerials, some did more gymnastics, some did fancier pirouettes, in Southampton the
Electricity choreography did not vary much. I reiterate that the performances are still highly impressive; after all, I suspect this dance went a long way toward winning Peter Darling his BETM Olivier and Tony awards.
One odd metric I have that was met on The Tour was consistently seeing Billy out of breath for the closing stanza of
Electricity, having given maximum effort for the dance. In other productions I am seeing Billy being able to sing that stanza as it is on the cast recording, holding "and I'm free, I'm free" for most of the measure. Meaning the
Electricity dancing wasn't as much challenge to him as it is on The Tour where it turns into a quarter note so that Billy can squeeze a couple more breaths in.
Last example pertains to the emotional first Letter scene. In Southampton, there is a real orchestra pit separating the audience from the stage so I could not tell if any of the Billys shed real tears there. Each of them performs the actions of wiping tears away so the effect is there and meets the "uniformly excellent" level of interpretation. But it was often the case in the past where a Billy shedding real tears in that scene made it extra special. Not sure if it is happening on The Tour.
All told, this
"uniformly excellent" approach just about guarantees a consistently great performance every show. Even with the long running time, the audiences I saw were in rapt attention all the way through to the final final curtain. During the multiple dramatic pauses, there was absolute silence; one could hear a pin drop. For us BETM veterans,
"uniformly excellent" makes the job harder to capture and describe the different strengths among these Billys. They are there to be seen and I'm sure most of us will be willing to take on the challenge.
The very best change that I observed in The Tour is allowing Billy to actually break character for a moment, when he has just finished
Electricity. It didn't occur in every performance, but seeing it happen more than once indicates to me that it is no longer considered a flaw. I call that a positive step because letting these young actors enjoy that moment is so richly deserved. When Billy breaks into a smile, it triggers an extra
roar of adulation from the crowd, and you know beyond any doubt this is
genuine response. Whereas the standing ovation after the
Finale might be contrived or politeness, the crowd reaction to
Electricity is as real as it gets. "Proper" acting may require Billy to stay in character. I for one fully support giving Billy permission to accept accolades for his efforts by hearing
1000+ people in full throat bringing down the house in appreciation of the spectacle they have just witnessed.
The one quibble I have is minor, but one I have to mention. For a show that allows many pauses to enhance the drama, it is ironic that there is one missing for Billy's final line. There is a pause just before the kiss with Michael and Billy has walked a few seconds before delivering the line. But the result of "See ya Michael" while in full stride makes it somewhat matter-of-fact. Having Billy pause his walk before delivering that last line adds a whole lot of meaning.