I just saw my local universtiy put on The Lightning Thief musical and GUYS. IT WAS FUCKING INCREDIBLE. LITERALLY ALL OF IT WAS SO FUCKING GOOD. Like the casting was good, the jokes landed, everybody stayed in character, all of the singing was fucking great (CHARON/MISTER D/HADES HAD LITERALLY SUCH A FUCKING PERFECT VOICE FOR THEIR ROLES I WAS LITERALLY IN AWE ANY TIME THEY WERE SINGING IT WAS THAT GOOD), all of the visual gags paid off, it was genuinely so fucking good!!!!

All my "theater" knowledge up until this point has been High School theater, and not great high school theater, so I was going into it expecting to have a pleasant but not overall mindblowing experience, you know, kinda trying to be chill about it. BUT THEN???? LIterally as soon as it fucking started I was like "Oh, oh this is like REALLY real."

And it was blackbox theater, which idk if that's a regular term of if it's just what my mom was calling it (she used to perform in this same theater that we were in, she's an alumni of this place) so it was super small, no real "stage", just a slightly raised platform and then chairs on risers along the perimeter. I kept making eye contact with the actor playing Ares/Gabe SOB that was really funny tbh. But I really loved it in that format because it felt way more intimate and like, real, if that makes sense? like it felt very On Brand for the musical to be taking place that close to the audience, and it genuinely sucked me in soooo much, sometimes I would register that there were other people across the room and I'd jolt like oh, right, this is a musical in this room we're all in aosiduaoisdu

I think Grover and Chiron were my favorite parts, though literally all of it was so fucking good I don't even know if I can say that. But Grover was jsut SOOO well done, like he was exactly how I envisioned him and also his faces and the physical gestures and everything were so Grover!!!! and Chiron of course was like, the perfect mixture of "I know everything and am your leader" and "i am a slightly bumbling idiot". His "tail" was a bunch of yarn stuck to the back of his pants and his "hooves" were the chorus making clopping noises every time he stepped (AND HE TOOK HIGH KNEE STEPS EVERY TIME IT WAS SO FUNNY. there was a gag where dionysus led him out of the scene by dangling a carrot and IDK if that's in the original musical or not but it KILLED ME)

I was so impressed by Percy and ANnabeth too!!!! percy's actor was for sure struggling near the end because, duh, it's a fucking hard musical, but the way they worked in water breaks for him and also the way that he handled it all was phenomenal! And Annabeth too, she had SUCH a hard role to play and she played it really fucking well, and confidently, and I believed that she and Percy's character genuinely were friends and liked one another. AND SALLY TOO!!! LIke she was soooo well played I really felt like she was Percy's mother, like she was there for him and loved him. And all of the scenes where there were like, interruptions, IE a character breaking into another character's lines like interrupting what they were saying, it worked out perfectly and was so natural which like, even in PRODUCED TV SHOWS AND MOVIES sometimes shit like that feels unnatural and that was genuinely part of what drew me in so much, it just all felt so NATURAL. Like I cannot even IMAGINE all the practice and hard work that these guys must've put into this production for it to be THAT good and well rehearsed. (again, all of my history of productions is high school productions so SOB BUT STILL!!!!!)

The fucking minotaruw as just two dudes running around in an enormous bathrobe on top of one another and THAT WAS ALSO SO WELL DONE LIKE LITERALLY

I could go on and on. I probably will go on and on (my friends and parents have already borne the brunt of my rambling because I want to REMEMBER THIS GODDAMMIT) in reblogs but wow. wowowowow. I HIGHLY encourage anybody who feels comfortable to go out and try and see a production of the musical if it's near you. Support your local productions and colleges and stuff. that was a damn good time.

oh damn and the fucking medusa scene? PErcy's actor literally running around waving his sword like a maniac WITH HIS EYES CLOSED and yet he didn't hit any of the people in the front row, who were on the same level as him. That was SO impressive, I was slightly in awe.

oh and YES, they did do the toilet paper visual. which ruled. obviously.