Mary Poppins a la Québecoise
Miscellaneous / July 17, 2016

Every summer a large, Broadway style musical comes to Montreal – read about my Wicked obsession from a couple of years ago.  Generally it’s in English and plays at the huge Salle Wilfred Pelletier.  This year, as the flagstone show of the Juste Pour Rire festival a Quebecois it was decided to stage a French language version of hit show Mary Poppins.  It was considered quite a risk, given the size of the production, but judging from the bottoms on seats and reviews it one which has paid off in spades. Yesterday I took myself off to see it at the Theatre St Denis and had a wonderful afternoon.  In terms of production values, the show was superb.  The sets are gorgeous, the cast is talented and well prepared, the magic tricks/stunts like when Mary Poppins enters or exits by flying high above the audience or the Banks disaster of a kitchen suddenly fixes itself are breathtaking.  Add to that the incredible Sherman Brothers’ songs and astounding choreography and you have a wonderful spectacle.  It produced one of the few mid show standing ovations I’ve experienced in North America.   The cause of that was the showstopping dance number Step…