Shrek The Musical Boardway

If you have not watched Shrek before, read this to understand it better: Shrek is a grouchy, terrifying green ogre who loves the solitude in his swamp, finds his life interrupted when many fairytale characters are exiled into his swamp by order of the fairytale-hating Lord Farquaad. Shrek tells them that he will go ask Farquaad to send them back. Farquaad tortures the Gingerbread Man into giving the location of the remaining fairytale creatures until his guards rush in with something he has been searching for: the Magic Mirror. He asks The Mirror if his kingdom is the fairest of them all but is told that he is not even a king. To be a king he must marry a princess and is given three options, in a parody of The Dating Game: Cinderella, Snow White, and Princess Fiona, from which he chooses Fiona, who is locked in a castle tower guarded by lava and a dragon. Shrek fights a fearsome dragon, rescues the princess and learns that real friendship and true love aren’t only found in fairy tales.

This DVD was released on 2nd December and on Digital HD from 18 November. It was filmed in 2010 and is a recording of the live Broadway show with 10 cameras which captured the magic of a Broadway performance.  Featuring a fantastic score of 17 all-new songs, along with unforgettable characters and outrageous humour, Shrek The Musical is ogre-sized fun for the whole family! As a bonus feature, it comes with a Shrek the Musical Songbook with seven Sing-Along song from the musical.  It lasts for 130 minutes.

I must admit that I was quite sceptical as to whether my children who are aged 6 and 4 would enjoy this when I put it on. It took them about 10 minutes before they understood that this is a musical and it is all about singing. Once the fairytale characters came out and sang, they were both enchanted by it. They especially love Donkey and thought he was particularly hilarious with his actions and singing! The whole cast, their costumes and their props were fantastic! It is very engaging that both children enjoy sat contentedly on the sofa and watched, laughed and asked a lot of questions about it!

Ms C loves the Gingerbread man and kept giggling when he sang while on the baking tray.  The dragon is spectacular with all the props and singing. The cute cat only briefly appeared on the scene.  The storyline revolves around Princess Fiona, Shrek, Donkey and Lord Farquaad. We all enjoyed it. Even though it is over 2 hours both of my children didn’t complain of getting bored! After watching this DVD, I would love to take them to watch the live performance in future. They won’t be touring in the UK until July 2014. I would highly recommend this DVD to anyone who love Shrek or musicals to get this! This is by far one of my favourite musical shows! It is worth to buying it to keep. It is an amazing production. I rate it 5 stars out of 5. A great DVD to watch on a family night in!

Disclosure: We received the sample for the purposes of writing this review, however, all thoughts and opinions remain our own.