Cricket (musical)
| Cricket | |
|---|---|
| (Hearts and Wickets) | |
 |
|
| Music | Andrew Lloyd Webber |
| Lyrics | Tim Rice |
| Productions | 1986 Windsor Castle 1986 Sydmonton Festival 1986 Lord's Taverners Ball |
Cricket, also called Cricket (Hearts and Wickets), is a short musical written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice. It was commissioned for Queen Elizabeth's 60th birthday celebration, and was first performed at Windsor Castle on 18 June 1986.
Several of the tunes from the show were later used for Aspects of Love, so the work was dropped from public performance or recording.Cricket was the last original musical Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote together.
After their collaboration on Evita in 1978, composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Tim Rice took what was originally intended to be a temporary break from their illustrious theatrical partnership. They did not work together again until the request for this pièce d'occasion came up, and Cricket ended up being their final original musical.
Prince Edward, the Queen's youngest son, commissioned a short musical from Lloyd Webber and Rice for his mother's 60th birthday celebration. The game of cricket was Tim Rice's favourite pastime – he had a cricket field on the grounds of his home and had his own cricket team – and Rice had a particular passion for this new comic musical about England's national sport. Rice used actual cricket-related names for his characters, boosting the light-hearted feeling of the piece. He and Lloyd Webber created a 25-minute tongue-in-cheek "musicalette" for the Queen.
Cricket is entirely sung-through, with no spoken dialogue.
Set against the backdrop of the semi-fictional Headingley Cricket Club's matches, the comic and slightly melodramatic plot of Cricket has star player Donald torn between his team and his girlfriend Emma – as she decides to abandon watching cricket for what appears to be a far more exciting life at the race track with the caddish Vincent.
The leads in the cast are Donald, Emma, Emma's father, Vincent, and a West Indian fast-bowler from the opposing team named Winston B. Packer. The musical's chorus are the rest of the cricket players.
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