Super troopers riding along with the zest of a rave
Coventry Gang Show, Belgrade Theatre, until March 25 (starting time 7.15pm plus extra Saturday matinee).
Yes, they really are "Riding Along On the Crest of a Wave" at the Coventry Gang Show...all 82 of them...although that legendary Ralph Reader song is saved right until the end.
By that time the cubs, scouts, beavers and leaders from all over the city will have entertained you with everything from Robbie Williams to medleys from Jungle Book to Grease and from Fame via a wicked Spellbound.
It's pure nostalgia and a delight to see the whole of the Belgrade stage filled with enthusiastic singers, dancers and aspiring young comedians.
Even county commissioner Andrew Morris and his fellow scout leaders have the audience laughing their socks off with their 'Gangland Style' routine - on zimmer frames.
I loved the tribute to Lion King and Jungle Book by the junior performers, aged from six upwards. Meanwhile,"still in the Gang" Pete Boon, a mere 65, is hilarious as the cub nobody wants in their pack.
The "spooktacular" start of Act Two is particularly effective with great lighting and seemingly everyone turning to the dark side.
While on the teenage front the girl scouts definitely put a zing back into the 1950s leaving the boys to channel John Travolta and The Fonz - surely they're too young to have watched either in action!
Show director Clive Bennett makes excellent use of the whole stage and seems to have instilled a huge sense of discipline right across the age range. This is evident in the larger set pieces that could so easily have ended in a catastrophic pile-up of bodies.
None of that happens, these are confident young actors, backed by scores of backstage hands including a whole team of wardrobe volunteers who must have been sewing for the past 12 months.
This is Coventry's 57th Gang Show - the style doesn't change - but the young people singing 'We Are The Future' and "It's A Wonderful World' still bring a tear to the eye.
Before they get you up and surfing on that wave.
Well done to all involved.
