BRAMPTON: Awesome! Brilliant! Stunning!
This is how the adaption of the musical Les Miserables struck me and, judging by the thunderous applause after each scene, the rest of the audience also loved it at the Rose Theatre in Brampton on the outskirts of Toronto on its opening night November 6.
It was indeed a very bold undertaking by the Brampton Music Theatre of Victor Hugo’s epic novel on the French Revolution and they pulled it off with real élan.
Set in the 1800s France, Les Miz (as it is popularly known) is the story of an ex-convict Jean Valjean and his road of trials and tribulations to redemption. It is loosely based on the real life story of an ex-convict Eugene Vidocq who becomes a successful businessman and on passages of Victor Hugo’s own life.
After being released from prison, Jean Valjean uses silverware that he ‘steals’ from the bishop Myriel who offers him shelter for the night. With proceeds from the silverware he starts a factory and becomes a rich person and engages in philanthropy and helping the poor and wretched.
The story is about progress from evil to good, from injustice to justice, from falsehood to truth and from darkness to light.
It is as relevant today as it was then and will stay relevant (paraphrasing Hugo here) ‘so long as there shall exist, by reason of law and custom, a social condemnation, which, in the face of civilization, artificially creates hells on earth, and complicates a destiny that is divine with human fatality; so long as the three problems of the age—the degradation of man by poverty, the ruin of women by starvation, and the dwarfing of childhood by physical and spiritual might—are not solved.’
All the injustice and humility suffered by the lower classes in France led to fighting in the streets in Paris and the French revolution in 1832. This is what the musical is all about by relating the story of Valjean and his interactions with all his surrounding characters giving a personal touch to everything, showing intensely played out scenes of factories, cafes, ‘painted ladies and a bottle of wine’ and other social and life impacting commentaries from that era.
Even the colourful clothes in the musical depict the apparel worn in those days
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The musical from the time it opened in London almost 30 years ago is the longest running musical of all time and according to the Guinness World of Records has the largest number of concurrent productions at any given time.
Bravo to the Brampton Music Theatre for creating an amazing concurrent homegrown version of Victor Hugo’s sweeping cherished chef d’oeuvre to add to that repertoire!
This not to be missed formidable adaptation runs at The Rose Theatre in Brampton until Nov 14.
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