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We Will Rock You: 7 Years
| We Will Rock You celebrated its seventh anniversary with an extra special performance last night. Taking the audience of over 2,000 by surprise, Queen’s legendary guitarist Brian May and the show’s writer Ben Elton both made on stage appearances at the end of the show. A few familiar faces were spotted sitting in the audience including the show’s musical supervisor Mike Dixon, former London and Australia Galileo Mig Ayesa and London’s original Meat Kerry Ellis, who made her last appearance as Elphaba in Wicked last Saturday, as well as various other former cast members. |
  The Dominion's statue of Freddie Mercury that has become a popular landmark on the corner of Tottenham Court Road; Roger Taylor, Ben Elton and Brian May, the creative team behind We Will Rock You |
| During the show’s rousing climax, the audience went wild as Brian May rose through a trapdoor in the stage, playing the celebrated guitar solo from Bohemian Rhapsody, arguably Queen’s greatest classic. Brian May’s appearances on the show’s special occasiosn have made We Will Rock You’s anniversaries (as well as Freddie Mercury’s birthday) important dates in fans’ calendars, and tickets sell out months in advance. Ben Elton appeared briefly on stage during the show brandishing beer bottles and worshipping at May’s feet to the ecstatic cheers and screams from the audience. In a short speech, peppered with excited expletives, about how thrilled he was by the show’s tremendous success over the past seven years. He praised the show’s current cast (which features Mazz Murray and I’d Do Anything finalist Rachel Tucker) and expressed his excitement at having appeared on the stage through a trapdoor with such a legend as Brian May. The show ended with May and the cast performing Queen’s poignant standard The Show Must Go On, before the cast and invited guests partied the night away at in the Dominion’s newly refurbished function rooms. |
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| We Will Rock You’s unfailing success continues to defy the critics who universally panned the show when it opened at the Dominion Theatre in 2002. Its reviews were harsh, yet the appeal of the timeless classics of Queen Ben Elton’s comic story of musical renegades in a dystopian future has kept the crowds coming. We Will Rock You has built its reputation on word of mouth and the unpretentious, escapist entertainment it provides places it high amongst London’s top shows. At the end of last year, while the British media was frenzied in its reports of economic tragedy bring the nation to a standstill, We Will Rock you still managed to break theatre records by achieving the highest weekly attendance the West End had ever seen. The show has now been seen by over two million people in London alone, and it does not look like We Will Rock You’s success will stop at seven years either. The show has been seen in sixteen different countries, with new productions currently being developed in Italy and Sweden. Earlier this year, a UK regional touring production was launched. The plan had originally been to close the London production and stage the tour in its stead, but the enduring popularity and seemingly endless demand for the show justified running the two productions concurrently. At a conference to promote the tour, Ben Elton revealed that there is yet more planned for We Will Rock You, with talks of a film and, more excitingly, the recent completion of a sequel which should hopefully be ready for the stage in 2010. We Will Rock You has recently extended its booking period once again, and tickets are now available until March 2010. Grab yours here. |
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