A child free day out

Well over a year ago, after sitting for over 12 hours in an online queue and parting with a large amount of cash, we managed to secure a couple of tickets to see Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. I was ecstatic. Stu was slightly less enthusiastic - despite being the one who had sat in the online queue for the tickets.

My parents agreed to come down to watch the children for us (to be fair, they didn’t take much persuading) and so yesterday we managed a child-free day out in London. This was my first time not doing Benjamin’s bedtime, but it appears my dad is more successful at getting the little man to sleep than me as he was asleep by 7.10pm (Benjamin, not my dad!).

The Harry Potter play is split into two parts, and the first wasn’t starting until 2pm, so we decided to go do some London stuff beforehand. I needed to return something to the Disney Store so we had a browse down Oxford Street,  I tried some ridiculous coats on in Zara, and I tickled Moz the Monster’s feet in the John Lewis window (sorry Chris Riddell!). We’d managed to arrange to meet my brother for a quick catch up so we all had a wander down Carnaby Street and took Stu for his first ever browse of Liberty. I mean, he’d never even heard of it! To say he was underwhelmed would be an understatement...although I have to agree that their Christmas Shop was a bit of a disappointment this year.

After a quick coffee it was time to head to the theatre. I was gutted to see that the beautiful theatre is actually surrounded by boards (mind blank...what are they actually called?!) but managed to get an extremely average cheesy photo.

Despite having had the book sat on my bookcase since it’s publication day, I decided not to read it until after I’d seen the play - a feat made much easier by having two small children, making sitting down with a book nigh on impossible! I was actually really glad I’d done this as it meant that everything was a surprise me. I had no idea of the story, which characters would be involved, or even what kind of format the production would take. 

Both parts of the play were absolutely amazing, I’ve never seen anything like it before. The effects were fantastic, and the stage and set design was so clever. It is pretty fast paced and I found the first 15 minutes a bit manic but I soon settled into it and really loved it. Without spoiling anything, I did find one of the “big” scenes towards the end of part two a little disappointing. I think, under normal circumstances I wouldn’t have batted an eyelid, but with the rest of it being so cleverly done, the effects seemed a little crude in comparison. Having said that, I know next to nothing about how productions like this are planned, designed, or executed so would have no suggestions on how it might have been improved upon. The whole cast were great, and the performance was really witty. I certainly didn’t expect to laugh as many times as I did. I would absolutely go and see it again next week...if I had a lot more money and didn't have to sit online for 12 hours to get my hands on tickets!

What was extra lovely about our theatre trip was that my friend, who I have know since Primary School and now lives in Newcastle, was coincidentally at the same performances. In fact, she was even sat on the same row as us! We had almost 3 hours between shows so we grabbed an early dinner together (at Leggero if you were interested) for a catch up. Best coincidence ever!