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# Review: End of the Rainbow @ Birmingham Hippodrome
- URL: https://lichfieldlive.co.uk/review-end-of-the-rainbow-birmingham-hippodrome/
- Published: 2011-10-18T20:01:15.000Z
- Updated: 2011-10-18T20:01:36.000Z
- Author: Phil Preece
- Tags: Reviews, What's On, #wp, #wp-post, #Import 2026-07-22 21:41

[![End of the Rainbow](https://storage.ghost.io/c/e3/90/e390c3da-0866-4d2a-8ffe-ca4999d7ce1c/content/images/lichfieldlive-co-uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/endoftherainbow.jpg "End of the Rainbow")](//lichfieldlive.co.uk/2011/10/18/review-end-of-the-rainbow-birmingham-hippodrome/endoftherainbow/)

End of the Rainbow

I went to see this show about the late Judy Garland with some trepidation, expecting to a naff tribute act belting out so-so songs linked by sentimental hype. Instead I found Peter Quilter’s brilliant award-nominated play, featuring a performance by Tracie Bennett as Ms Garland that genuinely recreated the imperishable magic of this showbiz legend.

Little Miss Leatherlungs, aka child performer Ethel Gumm became Judy Garland and blossomed in her teens into one of MGM’s greatest stars when that really meant something. She remains the only film actress who could sing, dance and act all at the same time.

Despite the divorces, the breakdowns, the pills and being fired from the studios while still only 27 which more or less ended her film career, Ms Garland went on to refashion herself as the supreme concert performer surpassing even the great Jolson himself. Her 1961 live album Judy At Carnegie Hall sold 40 million copies in America in its year of issue. Judging by the packed Monday night Hippodrome audience her status as a legend still endures more than forty years after her death.

So how to put all this on the stage? Well playwright Peter Quilter cleverly and poignantly sets his drama in a suite at a grand London Hotel, probably the Savoy, where Ms Garland has arrived to play the Talk Of The Town and run up new debts accompanied by her next (younger) husband, club pianist Mickey Deans, played very ably here by Norman Bowman. She is a few short weeks from death. Quilter gives us the tantrums, the traumas, the drinking and the pill popping as Judy first prepares for, nearly bombs at, and then triumphs in what must have been one of her final concerts.

His Judy is Tracie Bennett, a performer who uncannily recreates the maddening chutzpah, explosive verve, glittering glamour, superb chic and sheer wit of this wayward child whose whole life with its highs and lows had been played out before the public.

Ms Bennett vividly evokes this most mesmeric of performers, effortlessly catching her mannerisms, her walk, her tiny frame, her way of holding her head, and incredibly, her voice. I’m not going to say any more, except that the script is full of frank expletives and laugh-out-loud one liners. Hilton Macrae as Anthony, her gay accompanist and admirer achieved a tenderness that gave this vivid play an extra dimension.

By turns hilarious, sophisticated, exhilarating and deeply moving, End Of The Rainbow had even the hardest-boiled critics in tears at this evocation of the supreme showbiz legend’s life, snuffed out far too young at only 47 years of age.

The final show-stopping number, By Myself, in which Judy, returning to the stage after popping enough pills to fuel a jet plane produced a firestorm of movement and vocal pyrotechnics which evoked that rarest of audience accolades, a spontaneous standing ovation.

Definitely the best thing I’ve seen so far this year which may well prove impossible to top. If you only go to the theatre once a flood, make this your yearly treat.

End Of The Rainbow including matinees runs at the Hippodrome until October 22\. For tickets phone the box office on 0844 338 5000 or go online at [www.birminghamhippodrome.com](http://www.birminghamhippodrome.com/?ref=lichfieldlive.co.uk).