Originally the creature was stripped of his voice in many versions including the 1931 film which a lot of people are familiar with and it created the stereotypical interpretation of creature but in this show tradition is broken.
A lot of people are familiar with the birth of the creature with the giant machine and lightning but the show introduces the Creature like he is being born, the show starts with a weird material that contains a male shadow an arm rips through the material and then the entire body falls out onto the floor like the creature has been born naturally, its a very graceful way of introducing the show compared to the violent and inhumane way the creature is brought to life in other interpretations. For the next 5 minutes the creature tries to learn movement and walking, some people may have found it funny because it looked strange but it really showed the creatures struggle which Jonny portrayed brilliantly. Victor abandons the creature and he meets a blind man who overlooks his monstrous appearance and slowly he teaches the creature how to speak and for me the best part about the show was how the creature learnt and used his wide vocabulary, he became a very intellectual being that understood poetry, the seasons and love but with that intellect there is still that struggle of movement and speech. All through the play Jonny plays the creature brilliantly in such a unique way and really the whole show is unique.
a lot of credit must go to Danny Boyle who visualised the show and made it possible, the show is funny at points, strange and beautiful, there are some brilliant props in the show as well such as the backgrounds and in one scene a train type thing comes in with sparks flying every where and it looks great but the greatest prop or thing in the show is the hundreds of light bulbs suspended from the ceiling and they light up when the creature is born so I think it symbolises life... I bet there electricity bill isn't cheap
Onto Benedict, I think he is awesome and he manages to bring something really special to each role his does, in Sherlock he manages to modernize the famous character, Star Trek he makes Khan very evil and menacing and even though he is the baddie I feel sorry for him and finally in Frankenstein for me he uses both elements from Sherlock and Star Trek to create a genius who is mad and consumed in his work. Benedict is just so brilliant and always puts 100% into his roles, but for some odd reason I cannot imaging Benedict as the creature and I think that's because I'm so use to Benedict portraying human characters if that makes sense so I may have to wait until next year if they choose to do it again, fingers crossed they do!
The rest of the cast was fantastic even the female creature was good even though she didn't speak or have a big role but she was in a dream and it was a refreshing dream that showed the creature had the ability to feel and show compassion, it was a very nice scene but not my favourite.
I would say that my favourite scene was probably... the scene when the creature confronts Victor and it becomes clear that his creation has exceeded his expectations, but in it he demonstrates his use of words and the new feelings and memories he has gained and the rage and sadness he shows is just great. All of it was good to be honest but comparing it to a film there were no boring or unnecessary scenes, it got straight to the point, the characters were fun and sometimes a tad cheesy and the story was well structured a clear,I haven't seen many stage shows before but this was by far the best so far; my sister has kindly bought me tickets to see Coriolanus starring Tom Hiddleston which is going to be really good... I just have to find a plus one, let the search begin!!!!
Anyway, i would give this show a 8.5 and definitely recommend it to fellow Cumberbatch fans and anyone really but unfortunately you may have to wait until next year unless they decide not to do it again which I hope doesn't happen.
that's it for today, enjoy the rest of your week and thanks for reading this slightly different review :)
until next time
:)
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