Issue No. 57
November 2007
Gang Show Scotland by Bill Fleming Fifty Members of the 2007 Dundee Gang Show had the honour of appearing in Gang Show Scotland at His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen, on Saturday 18th August, along with representatives from the six other Scottish Gang Shows: Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Greenock, Inverness and Stirling. Each city put on a major musical number, as well as a shorter musical or comedy spot. All the cast also took part in the Opening and Finale. For its major musical number, Dundee chose to go with the Meat Loaf number from our April show. The cast put this item over in its usual competent style, with Laura Bain and Gavin White performing well in their duet. However, for once, I feel Dundee came of second or third compared with the other cities’. My favourite item was Locomotion by the Greenock Gang, a medley of songs with a railways theme and the participants of each song dressed to suit their own song. We had numbers such as Doing the Locomotion, Morningtown Ride, Last Train to San Fernando and an instrumental Chatanoogoo ChooChoo. My second favourite was Glasgow’s Las Vegas Magic, a wide range of magic tricks good enough to grace a professional stage to the accompaniment of a spectacularly dressed backing group singing songs with a magical flavour. After these two, I would put Dundee’s spot on a level with Stirling’s Jacobites by Name and Edinburgh’s Walking to the Kirk. Looking at the smaller spots that each city put on, Dundee came out well with two songs from Les Miserables. Megan Scott made an excellent job of Castle on a Cloud, while older girls Jenni Bangs, Stacey McPherson and Kerry Daly combined well in I Dreamed a Dream. Other items included Life Outdoors which was the Inverness version of 12 days of Scout Camp, and Bazaar Goings On by Greenock. The Finale gave us a tremendous climax to the show, two well known Scottish Anthems, Caledonia and Highland Cathedral, and two Gang Show Anthems; These Are The Times and Crest of a Wave. All the Drama of that momentous occasion wasn’t confined to the stage. First of all during the evening’s performance, the theatres fire alarm went off just as the Dundee cast was gathering behind the stage curtain. This was caused by pyrotechnics at the end of Glasgow's Las Vegas Magic. Then at the end of the show, the Dundee cast, parents and friends who’d come to see the show, endured a long wait outside the theatre when the keys of one of the hired buses were stolen while the bus was outside the front door. By the time the driver and a mechanic managed to get the bus going again, three hours had passed and we arrived back in Dundee at 2.30 on the Sunday morning. However despite this, it was a great evening and the show was a tremendous success.
Inside this Issue: • Director’s Spot • Our Survey Said • Look-A-Likes • Wrighty Writes • Plus more!!!!
This is your gazette. PLEASE write or draw something that we can include: These can be handed to Chris Jenkins at any rehearsal, or you can email:gazette@dundeegangshow.com