By Talia Carl­isle

Every­one is talk­ing about 35mm, and it’s not a meas­ure­ment, but a move­ment it seems, from the sound of new fans I’ve talked to.

35mm is a music­al writ­ten by Ryan Scott Oliv­er on at Gryphon Theatre until Sat­urday, which incor­por­ates music, ori­gin­al cho­reo­graphy and a live band led by music­al dir­ect­or Jess West­on.

Show dir­ect­or Emily K Brown said this show inspired her to start her own suc­cess­ful music­al theatre career back in her young­er years, so to be dir­ect­ing it in Wel­ling­ton is a dream come true.

Watch­ing the show cer­tainly feels like a fever dream, with no smoke machine spared, nor music­al or dra­mat­ic oppor­tun­ity left behind.

The show’s cent­ral per­formers do an incred­ible job to fill Gryphon Theatre as if it were an aud­it­or­i­um, and I would love to see them all per­form in one, one day soon.

The sound by Jac­ob Can­nell and light­ing by Riley Gib­son is sta­di­um worthy and a true work of art, which impresses me more than the eccent­ric images dis­played in the set – said to inspire the music­al num­bers through­out the 90 minute show.

The music is catchy, upbeat and pas­sion­ately delivered.

There are beau­ti­ful har­mon­ies, duets, and enga­ging group num­bers per­formed by the spec­tac­u­lar core cast of Laura Gard­ner, Kirsty Huszka, Tara Terry, Mar­ley Richards and Alex Rabina. Being a fan of Wel­ling­ton Foot­lights’ work already, I have high expect­a­tions of the deliv­ery and the energy and qual­ity nev­er wavers through­out the show.

Being a music­al, it is key to get the sound bal­ance right and the band deliv­ers a top notch per­form­ance worthy of its own show.

The musi­cians and act­ors seem to have the time of their lives, dan­cing non-stop and singing their hearts out, no mat­ter the dif­fer­ent sounds or styles, their pas­sion deliv­er­ing a per­fect pack­age.

Being a small ven­ue for such a large band and show is always tricky, as the music can make some of the singing hard to hear. This isn’t just the instru­ments, but each sing­er has their own style, worthy of a rock show, and mem­or­able rock­er Tara’s voice is quieter than the oth­ers’ but beau­ti­ful and worth hear­ing when it shines through.

It’s impossible to find any­thing to fault and I have heard only rave reviews for the show, so if you get a chance to see it, or Foot­lights’ future work, you’ll be glad you did.

I’m so grate­ful for their fear­less drive to deliv­er qual­ity theatre, when now more than ever we need to cel­eb­rate cre­ativ­ity, pos­it­iv­ity and com­ing togeth­er in a world and gov­ern­ment where arts need to be fought for.

Don’t be fooled by the catchy rock tunes, there are some ser­i­ous themes in the show and a lot of death in par­tic­u­lar men­tioned, des­pite the show feel­ing very much alive.

The most mov­ing is Leave, Luanne – a bal­lad about a women fight­ing the demons she faces being in an abus­ive rela­tion­ship, and no mat­ter how dark the con­tent, I can only see the beau­ti­ful dance solo per­formed and cho­reo­graphed by Mar­garet Hill shin­ing through (with addi­tion­al chore­graphy by dir­ect­or Emily and cho­reo­graph­er Katty Lau.)

The finale is a deli­cious prom scene with spe­cial per­formers arriv­ing in their gowns and STACEY O’BRIEN steal­ing the scene as they should as SARA BERRY. This includes cameos from dir­ect­or Emily, Mar­garet, Ella Dow­sett Farm­er and Julia McDon­ald, mak­ing The Bal­lad of Sara Berry easy to fall in love with and impossible to for­get.

No cre­ativ­ity is spared, no cos­tume unworthy of rock and roll, and every sound, sparkle and smoke machine poised ready to wow.

Thank you again Foot­lights for show­cas­ing some fant­ast­ic tal­ent and beau­ti­ful, fun writ­ing that we have become accus­tomed to – or if you haven’t yet, don’t miss your chance.