Oklahoma!

Oklahoma! is a musical that is set in the Mid West of America in 1906 and was performed at the Theatre Royal. It was a well acted and performed with some songs that you might recognise. It was really enjoyable and I felt that the performances of Curly, Laurey and Aunt Ellar were really good. At first I found it hard to get on with the character of Jud as it sounded like the actor was using a fake voice but it turns out that he just had a really deep voice.
There are a number of really good songs and you might recognise this two


It also helped me work out what the hell a Surrey with a fringe on Top was as it was the name of a pub in Sheffield.

The area of real interest wasn't really played out that much. At this time new laws were passed that allowed settlers to be given free land if they moved to Oklahoma. This would allow them to become a state. The enclosing of the land by farmers stopped the cowboys roaming the cattle freely over the land and led to some conflict. I felt that they could have made more of the fact that Curly crossed the boundary from one side to the other although the scene were he sold horse, gun and saddle hinted at this.

Like all art Oklahoma! is a reflection of the situation when it was written and performed and in many ways that is sometimes more interesting the art itself.