Beryl H

I was able to get a refund for Nutcracker on Saturday evening, first time ever in my experience at the Coli and I think in response to the rail strike forcing people to cancel, less 10% discount and paid back into my bank account. I could only swap the ticket for another ENB one and there weren't any.

The plot thickens - yesterday I received an E-mail from the Theatre Royal Brighton inviting me to buy discounted tickets for the Varna International Ballet, and as the prices were high I got one for Giselle on 13th February,( Nutcracker and Swan Lake are on the next two nights) without checking up, I've just looked again and it says the Company was founded in 1947 and this is their first UK tour, with dancers from Ukraine and European countries, this is the information that the Theatre Royal has been given.

I don't mind, it will just be lovely to see Giselle without a train journey!!!

I really enjoyed this, it was a unique concept, hard to describe, lots of colour, exciting dancing for the men, modern music that I liked, in fact Coppelia seemed the wrong title at times, and I smiled every time I saw Irek and Darcey! 

Royal Mail have just added strikes on December 23/24th, Scrooge lives!

It seems that putting a ticket on sale within 24 hours of the performance and if successful, paying the money back into your

bank account has been accepted as normal procedure again, it was before Covid, I've done it several times recently for last minute decisions. I send the E-mail to boxoffice@roh.org.uk

1 hour ago, Dawnstar said:

 

I must have been lucky recently because I've done Friday Rush something like 4 times for Mayerling plus the Rush before last for Nutcracker & on each occasion the site behaved fine & I got exactly the ticket(s) I wanted. I hope this doesn't mean they've done any behind the scene tweaks in the last week or two that are making it work less well. Unless there was a lot more demand for the Nutcrackers this coming week than there were for the first week of them?

I think your last sentence is true, many people have had to cancel Nutcrackers in  the last few weeks who want to see it before Christmas.

Agree the Friday Rush was horrible today, in contrast to the Friends on Tuesday, but I got a ticket for next Thursday evening, the train strikers are having a short break and the weather is supposed to be mild!

This new booking system makes using Gift Vouchers easier, I had 5 to use up, so I booked 5 good seats and I only had to pay just £30.

I always write everything down on paper but the ROH personal page does list them all and their use-by date.

If you ask for a Gift Voucher then it doesn't matter if the ROH re-sells your old tickets or not, you still get paid!

I always notice this character too 😊

I had a pleasant experience this morning too, I just have to enlarge the seating plan 2 or 3 times before clicking on a seat.

Many thanks, this does bring back memories, and how could I have forgotten John Curry 🙂

In the figure skating past there was a husband and wife partnership, their surnames were Protopopov (or similar) they were so serene and skated as one.

Thanks, I made a hash of recording this from the TV, I can give myself a

Christmas present now 😊

17 hours ago, Richard LH said:

Yes from their remarkable performances in these extremely physically demanding PDDs  you would never have guessed that Takada/Hirano were short-notice pairings, and the same can be said for Takada/Ball on Friday...the latter perhaps even more so given that (as far as I know) they haven't danced together in any major lead roles before.

I believe that Ryoichi Hirano and Akane Takada learnt the roles last time round but although Ryoichi didn't get a chance then, Akane Takada did on the last night, with Steven McRae, a fabulous performance!

I was so excited to see Francesca Velicu that I quickly booked for the 7th January, then realised it was a rail strike day!

Thanks to Emeralds' posting above, it may not be too difficult to change 🙂

I've booked a strike day Nutcracker, do you think the Coliseum will do a refund or exchange, they don't seem as flexible as the ROH.

I saw last night's performance minus Diamonds, I didn't want to push my luck with the trains too far, and this was my first visit since the "problems". Funny having to read the cast list the next day, I couldn't hear a word Kevin O'Hare said but did notice the Fille cast had changed. I think the shock of the Prima costumes had cooled off but I still didn't really like it, For Four by contrast looked wonderful from high up, lovely lyrical dancing from the four men. Enjoyed See Us again and was able to concentrate on Joseph Sissens.

I loved the Pouffer piece, brilliant to see Natalia Osipova and Steven McRae dance so passionately and with such speed!

There wasn't much connection with The Friends though, think they just like giving names to a triple bill 😉

I'm going to see this programme tomorrow, hopefully, and will see it from the back of the amphi which will give a totally different view from the cinema, I like seeing the whole stage effect. My favourite was Qualia but I was so pleased to see the pdd anyway, I have fond memories of the work when it was part of a new works triple bill after the ROH re-opened, it still looks fantastic 20 years on!

I was slightly disappointed with For Four, and couldn't keep a straight face during Prima, the dresses do look okay in photos but not in movement which is the point of ballet, See Us was much better than I expected, quite liked the music, didn't even notice Joseph Sissens due to the camera work, but liked the frailty of the young girl amongst all the stomping, think it will look better from high up.

I enjoyed everything else, think Steven McRae and Natalia Osipova are ideal partners physically, they move as one, and was surprised the Pam Tanowitz work was so classical.

Have only just signed in but to agree with you, I didn't like Prima, or more accurately the costumes, the only one that didn't make me need sunglasses was Fumi Kaneko's, all the girls dressed in different shades of that costume would have been lovely. I'll carry on reading the views, think mine will also be very different!

The cast list for tonight is up now, available in many languages, don't know if there will be an extended one later for the theatre audience,  I wasn't impressed by the Insights but look forward to seeing Joseph Sissens' slithery solo!

Many thanks Bluebird for providing some real information to go on, usually I've left before casting appears but I might be lucky enough to see tonight's casting and print it 😀

I'm thankfully at home at the moment but trying to work out how to get to London and back next week 🙂 

1 hour ago, Rob S said:

I think I'd have to pay for a berth although it would be educational, but I might just go to Brighton and back 😄

I wouldn't bet on it, I'm trying to work out how to get home next week, this

Saturday thankfully is okay but Monday to Thursday looks horrible!

I only joined the Friends when they took away the postal priority booking scheme, can't remember when that was 🙂

It's like Covid, just when you think it's over.........

Can't see the 3 train operators that I travel with yet on the list but it might

mess up my Mayerling on the 25th late night travel!