The Producers
Where to begin?
Perhaps a little springtime for Hitler
Mel Brook's spoof of Broadway theatre, The Producers, first saw the light in 1968 and has had a cult following ever since.
Totally politically incorrect, hilariously innuendo-laden and crafted by some of the best in the business. What's not to like?
The current production, directed and choreographed by five- time Tony winner Susan Stroman, had a baptism of fire when Richard Dreyfuss, who was supposed to play the conniving down-and-out Broadway producer Max Bialystock, left during rehearsals.
The fabulous Nathan Lane then took over for a bridging period, Brad Oscar followed, and the current and very worthy holder of the role of Max is Fred Applegate. (The latter played Max for around 800 performances on Broadway as well as on tour).
John Gordon Sinclair is the nerdy accountant Leo Bloom who discovers that Max's books are a disaster and Leigh Zimmerman (from Chicago) is the feisty legs up to here - if you've got it, flaunt it'' Swedish secretary Ulla.
Max's idea is to produce a show so appaling that it will close on the first night.
He and his new partner, Bloom, (and the willing Ulla) will then retire on the investor's money.
Max has a way with well- heeled little old ladies. All they need is some touchy- feely attention and the money flows.
Every backstage norm is turned upside down and hilarious scenes abound; there's an old women dancer line-up and a scene with two men poring through appaling scripts. Eventually, they find a sure-fire winner (or complete flop) - Springtime for Hitler, written by a Nazi fanatic.
The show, dancing Nazis and all, is, of course, a horribly over-the-top tasteless smash hit. And therein lies the rest of this uproarious tale which is easily still, as one London reviewer put it, the most fun you can have in London with your trousers on.
Contact: Drury Lane Theatre, Covent Garden at 0870-890-1109.
Mary Poppins
For supercallafragilisticexpiallidocius family fare, you can't beat Cameron Mackintosh's Mary Poppins.
Co-directed by Matthew Bourne and Richard Eyres, this is a truly magical take on the practically perfect nanny and it's not surprising that the show has played to packed theatres for nearly a year now.
With fabulous stage design by Bob Crowley and inspired choreography by Bourne, this is a pretty near faultless foray into the story of P L Travers's original creation.
For the stage show, actor/direction/writer Julian Fellowes has merged elements from Travers's book and the captivating Walt Disney movie.
There are some new songs and reworkings of the Disney songs, while Fellowes, for the most part, has given this Mary Poppins a little less sugary frivolity and a lot more of Travers's creative substance, giving the live show an edge over the movie.
In one scene a particularly nasty brimstone and treacle nanny ends up in a cage.
The Banks children are also sung a lesson, by their toys, on bad children and punishment.
For the most part though, it's fun and frolic as usual, from the lively curtain-up scene-setter song, with chimneysweep Bert (Gavin Lee) and his mates stepping in time, through the swishing of that all-important note up the chimney requesting a nanny with a cheery disposition''.
As in the film, the Banks parents (David Haig and Linzi Hateley) are at odds over the choice of nanny and some real doozies turn up at first.
But, of course, the choice position is soon filled and the children eventually get their nanny - the practically perfect in every way Ms Poppins played by the practically perfect Laura Michelle Kelly.
Kelly, who played a cracking Eliza in the Theatre Royal production of My Fair Lady in 2003, slips easily into magical mode, with Richard Eyre's well-paced direction keeping it all on fabulous track, scene after scene.
Lee, as Bert the chimneysweep, is a dancing singing delight and the flying finale, where Bert tap dances upside down, the children dance around the chimney pots and Mary Poppins flies out over the audience and into the theatre eaves, is a standing ovation moment.
An almost endless jolly holiday' which made me feel like rushing out to fly a kite!
I dragged my dour 13-year-old Playstation addict along: I'm too old for this.
He emerged whooping with delight
Contact: Prince Edward Theatre (Old Compton Street, near Leicester Square) at 020-7798-9200.
Guys and DOlls
Needless to say, there's nothing like a couple of Hollywood stars to set the box office tills ringing.
Carch Ewan McGregor as Skye Masterson with Ally McBeal's Jane Krakowski as Miss Adelaide, in Michael Grandage's classy revival of Frank Loesser's musical comic tribute to 40's lowlife - Guys and Dolls (the changing of the guard takes place on December 5 when Sarah Lancaster, Nigel Hardman, Jenna Russell and Nigel Lindsay take over the main roles).
Krakowski as the kookie, nasal Adelaide (some singer and some bod!) trying to drag her man up the aisle (over a 14 year period) is worth the ticket on her own.
As for McGregor, as the high rolling gambler who woos a Salvation Army doll (the fab Jenna Russell) for a bet - even after he tested his vocal chords in Moulin Rouge - he still can't sing. But, McGregor's voice fits his character well enough and The Force is definitely with him on stage.
The Scottish actor's boyish charm carries the role and the man can tango - watch out for the Cuban bar scene. Rob Ashcroft's choreography is spec tacular. Douglas Hodge plays the marriage-shy Nathan Detroit, with Martyn Ellis and Niall Buggy as the high spirited heavies, Nicely Nicely Johnson and Arvide Abernathy. The latter two are scene stealers of note.
Great songs, great cast and nightly standing ovations.
Contact: The Piccadilly Theatre at 0870-060-0123
Billy Elliot
One of those shows that if you can get a ticket, (they are quite literally gold dust), you'll watch, marvel and then want to go straight back in to see it all again.
If you've seen the movie, you might well wonder how this story, of a determined lad from up north who has a yen to do ballie, set against a vociferous miners' strike, could be staged.
The fact that it all works so brilliantly, from a dance class where miners, police and a bunch of bumbling little girl ballet dancers merge in a fabulous dance sequence, to a dreamlike setting where the young Billy Elliott rises from the misery of the doomed miners and soars, alternating with an older male dancer, into the eaves of the theatre, is down to Stephen Daldry's highly original direction - and a cast which just rises and rises above theatre norms.
At times complex, sarkily amusing and extraordinarily creative with some memorable music by Elton John, Billy Elliot, with its three alternating young stars (Liam Mower, James Lomas and George Maguire) is pure theatre magic.
Contact: The Victoria Palace Theatre at 0870-895-5577.
Chicago
If you didn't catch Hazel Feldman's international production of Chicago here in South Africa (the tale of the murderous molls on death row and the conniving lawyer with his razzle dazzle ways in court) then don't forget that the Kander and Ebb blockbuster is still playing the West End.
South African actress/dancer/ singer Amra-Faye Wright's name is right up there in those West End lights as the critically acclaimed sock-it-to-em Velma.
Things are really taking off for Wright, as she told Tonight a few weeks ago, but her next big announcement is still in the pipeline. As she puts it: I'm not counting my eggs before they hatch.
Meanwhile, as our own Idols march towards a third finale on M-Net, it's interesting to see that one of the past finalists, Darius Danesh, who came third to Will Young and Gareth Gates in the very first Pop Idols series, has scooped the role of lawyer Billy Flynn in the show.
Danesh joins the cast for eight weeks, from November 21.
Contact: Victoria Palace Theatre, Victoria Street, at 0870 165 8787
Ducktastic
Then there's this duck
What would theatre in London be without a duck called Daphne?
Daphne plays a magical mind-reading duck who emerges from the egg of half a 50-foot duck - as Al Pacino ponders the dawn of time
The duck has a starring part in this new Kenneth Branagh-directed play titled Ducktastic. Well it would be, wouldn't it?
But Daphne has had problems. You might have read about the R50 000 reward, plus six ducks eggs, offered by Branagh for Daphne's return, after she was ducknapped just two days before her big opening night at the Albery Theatre on the West End.
Duckstastic is Sean Foley and Hamish McColl's follow-up to their preposterous and absurd take (an unlikely hit) on shows by two of the UK's legendary comedians, Morecambe and Wise - The Play What I Wrote.
The plot? Inspiration has come from tales of those two Las Vegas über magicians Siegfried and Roy who gave up on the illusions and all things magical when one of the tigers, who was part of the act, badly mauled Roy.
In Ducktastic, an orang-utan replaces the tiger with which McColl's Siegfried character has that unfortunate incident during his Las Vegas show.
Now very much a failed magician and having returned to England, Siegfried is only allowed to use a duck in his act He meets his Roy (Foley) when he asks for an audience member to come up and help with the act.
And so a duck star (there are numerous ducks in this ) is born and hundreds of double entendre puns on fowl play.
Contact: Albery Theatre at 0870-950-0920; The Adelphi Theatre at 0870-950-0920.
The wacky, the wonderful - London's theatre-land offers the lot.
If you can't find a show featuring a duck, a brolly carrying magical nanny, a line-up of dancing grannies, an Idol playing a conniving lawyer defending a murderous moll, a tango dancing Salvation army gal, or a ballet pump-wearing miner's son, then you're not looking properly.