P&P Fan Encounter: May's M&G with Matthew Macfadyen and her J&W's Review

My last (but most certainly not least) post of 2013...

A P&P fan encounter from an ardent Pride & Prejudice/Matthew Macfadyen fan, the lovely and wonderful May (from Scotland) had a great pleasure in meeting Matthew Macfadyen up close and in person not once, but three times! She met him in his current stage play Jeeves and Wooster, which had gotten rave reviews and is on demand (that it will be extended for more shows until September 2014, but Matthew will only continue until April 2014).

Read May's M&G with Matthew Macfadyen and Jeeves and Wooster Review and candid photos of MM from outside the stage door below...

Jeeves and Wooster Review (by May) 

My review of Jeeves and Wooster is that it is a genius show! 

Wooster is terminally stupid and Jeeves, his butler, is super intelligent and gets Wooster out of various scrapes.

They tell the story as a play within a play.  Wooster has been told by a friend that he should go on the stage to tell the story of a ghastly weekend he spent at Totleigh Towers and he throws out his arms to the audience and says "here I am!"  Of course he makes a total mess of things and the first view of Matthew is when he glides onto the stage from the side to rescue him (he sort of takes this big step)  and says "Indeed Sir" (in that voice), quite a moment for MM fans.

From then the hapless Wooster attempts to tell the audience the story and Jeeves and Seppings his Aunt's butler, play the other parts.  To say it is hilarious is an understatement.  The plot is the stupidest you could ever imagine and there is a lot of slapstick which is pure glorious fun .  Of course Jeeves sorts everything out and Wooster states "I did rather well there Jeeves didn't I" to which Jeeves replies "Indeed sir" in that booming voice and with that raised eyebrow. We laughed our socks off.

I loved the play, I mean it isn't Shakespeare but it is very cleverly put together.  Matthew and Mark move the scenery around during the play too, so the timing has to be spot on.  It is a highly physical show and Matthew  has lost LOADS of weight.  Hey and he looks good in a dress too!  Makes a hilarious woman and the flirting with Bertie is just so so funny.  You would laugh your head off at Matthew playing the vamp!  Talk about putting Darcy behind you! 

The one disappointing thing is at the end they did a Charleston which was quite complicated, well the understudy Edward Hancock hasn't learnt it yet obviously and they missed that out on Monday night.  They had to bring in a special dance teacher and it took them ages to learn it and it is hilarious, one of the highlights of the show. But then the poor fellow had enough on his plate.

The understudy Hancock was quite a good Bertie, never missed a cue and had good projection. In fact if I hadn't seen Stephen Mangan I would not have thought bad of his performance at all.  He is not so stupid looking as Stephen if that is not too rude! LOL!

Matthew is having a ball doing this play, when he met us outside at the stage door he looked happy and relaxed.  I mean there are some fans who can be a bit pushy but I never met any such people on the 3 nights I stood at stage door.  

May's Candid Photos of Matthew Macfadyen 

outside the J&W stage door

(source: all MM photos courtesy of May. Thanks a lot!)

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NOTE: Were you lucky enough to have met Matthew, Keira Knightley, Rosamund Pike, Jena Malone and other   and crew (ie. Joe Wright, Dario Marianelli) or got a letter reply (with a signed autograph photo) from any or one of them? Contact and email me your fan story so we can all be jealous of you! See more fan stories archived here: P&P Fan Encounters.