If you love Strictly you will know the name. Flavia Cacace was a regular professional on there for seven seasons, finally winning the glitter ball trophy with Louis Smith. There is no doubt about her dancing credentials and she is an accomplished dancer. Sadly, her professional dancing partner Vincent Simone, who she has won several championships with, was injured so he did not appear in the show. This is disappointing but to replace him we were offered two alternatives, Leonel Di Cocco and Pasquale La Rocca.
Tango Moderno is not what you may expect. Flavia has a fantastic team of dancers around her. The show is polished and has a direction so there is a loose link between the set pieces with a theme of falling in love. What I was not expecting was some street dancing. It certainly is Moderno!
There were contemporary numbers with images of painting a picture, there was a fantastic blues number and there was of course tango. There was a lot of well-known songs including Are you gonna be my girl (Jet), 7 years (Lukas Graham), Just haven’t met you yet (Michael Bublé), When A Man Loves A Woman (Percy Sledge), Shape Of You (Ed Sherran), First Time Ever I Saw Your Face (Roberta Flack) and a new song, Bla Bla Bla Cha Cha Cha (where they are on their mobile phones doing a cha cha!). There was good use of the choice of songs and how they were interpreted by dance.
Female songs were sung by Rebecca Lisewski who has a great voice but is also a dancer. What a talent! Male songs were sung by Tom Parsons and he is amazing. Not only did he compare the show, reciting modern poetry to link the numbers, he could really sing (think Kaiser Chiefs style). I really enjoyed his performance and wondered if he has his own band as people would pay to see him. The live band were great and a special mention to violinist Oliver Lewis who had some set pieces including a very fast Flight Of The Bumble Bee. Oliver was the fastest violinist in the world in 2010 and it’s just awesome to watch. The audience came alive and cheered him. The whole cast were amazing and really talented professional dancers. Mary Lynn Tiep caught my eye as she has a presence on stage and is very captivating.
However, the reason we are here is to see Flavia and she is exceptional. She danced with both Pasquale and Leonel. Pasquale seems to be a good dancer but I did not feel any chemistry between him and Flavia which was a shame. Without feeling like a strictly judge, I want him to respond to her more and look at her. Look like he is really interpreting the dance rather than just performing the steps. Leonel was much better but didn’t have that many dances. The one that took the audience’s breath away was the Argentine Tango at the end of the show. That dance alone is worth the ticket price and left me with shivers down my spine. It’s a 10 from me!
This show is for anyone who loves dance or strictly. you do not have to be a dancer to enjoy it – it’s a beautiful night out.
Tango Moderno is at Milton Keynes Theatre until Saturday 18 November then continues its UK tour.
