Curve Leicester's The Addams Family stage show is a scream!

The notorious ghoulish and gothic The Addams Family has been given a musical theatre makeover in a new production at Curve Leicester which sees all the usual odd behaviour and kooky shenanigans you would expect from the deathly household.

The story sees daughter Wednesday Addams falling in love with an everyday teen jock called Lucas and together they want their parents to meet and accept their relationship of difference. After telling her dad Gomez to keep it secret from her mother Morticia, it begins an energetic show of misunderstandings, private moments and comedy mishaps.

The night kicks off with a huge bang involving the entire cast as we are dragged into their world during “When You’re an Addams” and the songs continue as the Lucas family show up and clash with the Addams’ strange lifestyle.

The show is punctuated throughout with floating ghosts from the past ensuring you never forget the haunted nature of the residence and the stage design is suitably spooky with crashing thunder and lightning and an omni-present moon adding to the creepy atmosphere.

For people my age (*cough* 40-something *cough*) The Addams Family TV show of the 60s was often repeated on TV but it soon became a successful film in 1991. And helped kick off the 90s craze for adapting old shows into movies. Sadly, most were awful.

But this one was not. The Addams Family - and its 1993 sequel Addams Family Values – together made over $300 million at the box office and were surprise successes. After that, further animated series, video games and films were released before Netflix recently debuted “Wednesday”, a spin-off with Jenna Ortega as the gothic teen.

Yet aside from its iconic theme tune and rapper MC Hammer’s tie-in song for the 1991 movie, who would have thought this eight decades-long pop culture staple would suit the musical theatre treatment.

But tonight we found out why. And it’s almost entirely down to the great ensemble as the whole cast get their chance to shine. Morticia (Alexandra Burke) is a bastion of matriarchal power, Uncle Fester (Clive Rowe) has excellent comedy vim and an hilarious voice and son Pugsley (Nicholas McLean) gives a mischievous performance to try and breakup the young couple. Also, Lesley Joseph as Grandma and Dickon Gough as Lurch provide even more comedy chops in chucklesome support roles.

Yet the standouts for me were Ricardo Afonso and Lauren Jones. Afonso holds the whole show together as Gomez Addams, trying to find a balance between supporting his daughter’s choices and his wife’s demands. He delivers plenty of laughs with a Hispanic twist and has passionate flamenco-style moves in an entertaining dance number with Morticia (and some apt ghosts).

Lauren Jones as Wednesday provides a barnstorming soaring voice to the proceedings and her exquisite performance of “Pulled” had the audience erupting. A note-perfect rendition, she controlled the stage and made this a true magical musical achievement.

The only drawback was a slightly lacklustre second act which didn’t quite have the pull of the first. In fairness I chalk this up to the huge expectations the cast and production set in the first.

By the end though, with its talented cast, catchy tunes and some of the best singing and voices I’ve ever heard at Curve Leicester, the frightfully funny The Addams Family stage show really is a scream!

★★★★½

Michael Sales

For more information & tickets check out the details at Curve online

https://www.curveonline.co.uk/whats-on/shows/the-addams-family/