NEW INTERVIEW: Victoria Hamilton-Barritt, currently in rehearsals for The View UpStairs at the Soho Theatre

Victoria Hamilton-Barritt is one of our top leading ladies, she is currently in rehearsals for the European premier of The View Upstairs at the Soho Theatre. Her other credits include The Wild Party (The Other Palace), Murder Ballad (The Arts Theatre), In the Heights (Southwark Playhouse & Kings Cross Theatre), A Chorus Line (London Palladium), Gypsy (Leicester Curve), Flashdance (UK Tour & Shaftesbury Theatre), Grease (Piccadilly Theatre) and Saturday Night Fever (UK Tour). We Caught up with her whilst she was in rehearsals. 

You’ll be appearing in the European premier of the off-Broadway hit musical, The View UpStairs. Tell us a bit about the show. 

We're telling the story of an arson attack against the LGBT+ community in 1973 New Orleans, which killed too many people for a dinky upstairs bar in the French Quarter. Without giving away any spoilers, the show is revisiting that very evening but not in the obvious way you'd imagine. The show fluctuates between 2019 and 1973. Almost a hallucination? I don't want to spoil anything, but we're telling the stories of perhaps what could have possibly happened that night. The goings on within their community life in this supposedly safe haven, where people can be themselves, are not judged for who they are and can enjoy the company of similar-like souls in their friends.

And you’ll be playing the role of Inez, can you tell us a bit about her? 

Inez is a loyal mother who would never turn her back on her son. Freddy (Inez's son played by the wonderful Garry Lee) was discovered wearing his mother’s makeup and clothes at a young age by his father. The father left them both to fend for themselves, in a country that wasn't their own. Because of this neglect and disappointment from the father they started a life together, just the two of them. Their bond is so strong, and she is so proud of her son. She puts makeup on his face and helps put his costumes together for his drag performances, living her dream of show business through him and her new found family at the bar.

Pocket Size Theatre 5th Anniversary: Our Top 10 Interviews!

We have been lucky enough to interview some incredible performers, from all lines of work. We have collected together our top 10 most viewed interviews over our 5 years at Pocket Size Theatre and here they are! And what a selection of people we have. Click on the images to read the interviews. 

15 of the most Memorable performances I've ever seen

I was looking through a bunch of my old programmes and it got me thinking about some of the fantastic performances I have seen over my years of going to the theatre. So I've put together a list of some of my most favourite and most memorable performances I've had the pleasure of watching. 

So, in no particular order... 

Oliver Thornton as Adam (Felicia) in Priscilla Queen of the Desert 

Katherine Kingsley as Lina Lamont in Singin' in the Rain

Victoria Hamilton-Barritt | Interview

Victoria trained at Central School of Ballet and Urdang Academy of Performing Arts, when she graduated she was cast in the UK Tour of Oh What a Night! In the role of Cat and then moving with the production to Germany. Her other credits include Stephanie Mungano in Saturday Night Fever (UK tour), Connie in the Saturday Night Fever (Scandinavian tour), Carmen Diaz in Fame (Aldwych), Anita in West Side Story (international tour) Maria and understudy Susan in Desperately Seeking Susan (Novello), Alex in Flashdance (UK Tour and West End), Rizzo in Grease (West End), Gypsy Rose Lee in Gypsy (Leicester Curve) and has appeared in Bohemian Rhapsody (international tour). She is currently playing Diana in the London Revival of A Chorus Line at the London Palladium. She was kind enough to take time out of her busy schedule to answer a few questions…


Your family has a musical background, how influential was that for you growing up?
Very much so in the sense I was always being entertained by my uncles who always made a racket with pots and pans and anything else they could find around the house! They are both musicians who played in bands The Clash for a brief time before the band got super famous and other bands that would play the north west London scene of Kensal rise and Camden. They are a talented drummer and bass player and pots and pans terrorists! My dad sang the soho night life were he did his Billy Fury and Elvis numbers! 

A Chorus Line the Musical: Theatre Review

Set on Broadway in 1975, A Chorus Line is a musical about dancers who are auditioning for a Broadway show. The original production opened off-Broadway in 1975 and transferred onto Broadway in the same year due to the production having a sell out run and the show also won 10 out of 12 Tony Award nominations. The show ran for 6,137 performances and closed in 1990. A West End production of the show opened in 1976, in the same year U.S and International tours started. Many international productions opened and a film adaptation was released in 1985. A Broadway revival opened in 2006 and closed after running for just under two years, this production recently transferred to the West End marking the shows first ever West End revival. The production is being dedicated to composer Marvin Hamlisch who died last year. 

The is set in an empty Broadway Theatre where an audition is to take place, it follows 17 veteran dancers who are looking for one last job before it’s too late for them to dance anymore. Marvin Hamlisch and Edward Kleban’s score has to be Broadway at its best; each and every song is catchy. When you walk out the theatre each person is humming a different tune! One thing they manage to do, along with the help of James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante’s book, is create 17 characters that all get an individual story making the audience create a wonderful connection with every single cast member. This is truly an ensemble piece and I’m pretty sure there isn’t anything else out there like this.