Our Boys

I was surprised to learn that out of the 6 ladies who showed up for Theater Day this week, 3 of them had never seen Les Miserables.  Shocking!  Fortunately for me, the other two women had seen it several times, so they decided to come with me to see a play they'd never heard of while the rest of the group took advantage of the half-price matinee tickets for Les Miz.

Actually, I didn't know much about the play myself, but having seen the ads for it, I was excited to find it listed at the half-price ticket booth.  Our Boys is about six soldiers in a military hospital in the mid-80's.  What?  That doesn't sound like something I'd want to see?  Fair enough, but let me tell you who is in it: Laurence Fox!  Never heard of him?  He plays police detective James Hathaway in the TV series Lewis.  And surely you know Matthew Lewis!  Yes, you do.  He was Neville Longbottom in the Harry Potter movies.  Yes, that chubby, awkward kid who ended up being cuter than all his male costars by the final movie.

The intimate Duchess Theatre

The Duchess Theatre is one of the smaller ones in the West End, and our seats were right in the center of the third row.  Sweet!  (Especially so when Laurence Fox stripped down to his undies, and one of the other cute male characters had a hospital gown malfunction.)  All three of us ended up really enjoying the play, which was a mix of comedy and tragedy, and not at all predictable.  Both Mary and Barbara, the two ladies who joined me, said they may even see it again with their husbands.

 

With Mary and Barbara outside the Lyceum Theatre

Our Boys closes on December 15, so if you're in London, don't procrastinate!  And if you see hordes of teenage girls standing outside the stage door of the Duchess Theatre with cameras and Sharpies at the ready, you can blame that on Neville Longbottom and James Hathaway...