Preview: The Marriage of Kim K

‘The Kardashian Musical… The Mozart Opera… AT THE SAME TIME’.

The Marriage of Kim K is a Gogglebox-inspired musical, that was a 5-star, multi-award-winning cult hit of summer 2017. Now, it’s back, (dis)gracing the Lowry’s Studio stage for a short, but sweet, run.

The musical is billed as a ‘brisk, joyous and ambitious take on Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro‘, which will also be showing at the Lowry, courtesy of Opera North. I’d ask the more high-brow amongst you to take a leap of faith and give this reimagining a go, but I don’t have to – the 5-star reviews of Kim K speak for themselves.

The show features ‘three squabbling couples’ and ‘three styles of music’. ‘The biggest problem of all’, however, is ‘how to love what you think you hate? Each world has a distinct sound: grandly traditional for Figaro, slick electronic for the Kardashians –and catchy pop for Stephen and Amelia, a young couple arguing about what to watch on television’.

Genre-bending string quartet Echo Chamber, ‘who recently launched at the Manchester International Festival’s FIMH mixing classical with Kanye West (Kim’s current husband), and have just finished a sell-out solo tour,’ will also be Keeping up with Mozart, Figaro and the Kardashians in this operatic musical episode of Gogglebox.

The musical comes from northern music/theatre duo Leoe & Hyde, who live and work together in central Manchester. They like to write musicals for the twenty-first century. They want theatre to be innovative and entertaining.

They share the process of creating a musical and putting it on at the fringe in a Kardashian-inspired series called Keeping Up with Leoe & Hyde.

Following the UK tour of The Marriage of Kim K, they will be staging their new immersive coffee-shop musical Queueue, and ‘they have their eyes looking towards the stars’ for a brand-new VR musical!

Whilst they are professional partners, each has a solo career. Stephen Hyde is a director and theatre composer who loves neo-noir aesthetics and Shakespeare, whilst Leoe Mercer is a writer and poet, who has a tendency towards free spelling and emojis. They also collaborate with other theatre-makers, including Hyde’s all-female musical, The Inevitable Quiet of the Crash.

The Marriage of Kim K runs at the Lowry from Wednesday 13th – Saturday 16th November, before continuing its UK tour.

Keep your eyes out on The Mancunion’s social media pages for a chance to win a pair of tickets to the performance on Friday 15th!