Toy Show The Musical: A cynical, arrogant money-grab by an organisation that appears to have forgotten its primary purpose

21 comments

  1. First reviews coming in and they are not kind.

    It will be interesting see how it shakes out when it’s over. Could be a monumental disaster on RTEs hands given how much difficulty they had selling out. And if word of mouth is this bad I can’t it picking up.

  4. Kids don’t care about the Toy Show anymore. It’s the adults that care. And it’s nowhere near as good as it was. It’s all sob stories and “look at this piece of crap made in Ireland, kids should love this”.

    Back in the day it was showing the toys that kids wanted or might want and was generally good craic too.

  5. Could we please stop linking to news sites with paywalls?

    The Independent has this article locked behind a subscription.

  7. I’m not saying I know people involved with it and I’m not saying that they were rubbing their hands together with a Mrs Burns type glee but I don’t know how to finish this sentence…

  12. We’re a gas bunch. We whinge and moan about the toy show being a money grab but then we also love to tell everyone around the world about how it’s a unique part of our National identify that we all grew up with and it’s traditional to watch it every year. A true nation of begrudgers.

  14. RTE are definitely cash-grabbing, but there are also hundreds of experienced people and young children working on this that are trying their best, just for cynical journalists and internet experts to shit all over it.

  16. Having actually gone to see this last night…. it is really not good. Hate to be piling in when there’s already plenty of criticism going round but at 50e a ticket it’s only fair people are forewarned.

    I actually feel sorry for the kids involved as they did give it their all and the lead girl(s) are super singers and actors.

    Some specific criticisms:

    – The plot is weak as dishwater. A really clichéd set up straight out of a Hallmark movie.

    – The adult cast vocals are poor overall. Since it’s a musical that’s not going to fly.

    -There was a general air of chaos with the backstage management e.g. dead microphones frequently (not activated on time it seemed); Prop / scenery changes were very clunky. There was a screw up with hoisting a prop at one stage… I think someone got injured cause they had to stop the show for a few minutes.

    -There was no curtain and the wings were fully visible to the crowd throughout which completely distracted from the main action on stage.

  17. I think it shows just how much RTE doesn’t understand the Irish audience.

    They think they have a family friendly, heart warming TV show that children love. What they actually have is a thing that adults watch while getting shit-faced.

  18. The toy show has been devolving into a series of cobbled together social media friendly clips for years. My kids told me they went really bothered to watch it this year as they weren’t really any toys in it any more and was just full of songs.
    So it’s really not surprising this disgrace of a creation has come into existence. A musical based on the worst parts of a declining show …woopee.

  19. Forgotten it’s primary purpose? They have always been there to bore the utter shite outta everyone. I commend them for staying on target for so long.

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