High Society.
Press night at Leeds Grand Theatre.
Old-school glamour and enough champagne-fuelled chaos to make one society wedding considerably more interesting than planned.
This week, I attended the Press Night performance of High Society at Leeds Grand Theatre, and it delivered a wonderfully glamorous evening filled with comedy, romance and classic musical theatre charm. Thank you so much to Kelly and the team for the invite!
I was so excited to attend the press night of High Society at Leeds Grand Theatre, particularly because Helen George is leading the cast as glamorous socialite Tracy Lord. As a huge fan of Call the Midwife, I was really looking forward to seeing her take on such a completely different role.
Set in Newport, Rhode Island, High Society centres around Tracy as she prepares to marry the rather dull George Kittredge. Unfortunately for the happy couple, Tracy's ex-husband Dexter Haven has other ideas and quite literally sails back into her life just before the wedding. Add two journalists searching for a society scoop, plenty of alcohol and a family with more than a few secrets, and the carefully planned celebrations rapidly descend into chaos.
High Society ticks all the boxes for an evening of entertainment. It's wonderfully traditional musical theatre, but there's enough comedy, romance and spectacle to make the production feel accessible even if you're unfamiliar with the original story.
Helen George completely embraces Tracy's combination of elegance, stubbornness and ridiculousness. She's every inch the glamorous society bride when required, but I particularly enjoyed her comedic performance. Once Tracy begins drinking and those carefully maintained social graces start disappearing.
She also has fantastic chemistry with Julian Ovenden as Dexter. Ovenden brings a relaxed confidence to the role, and it's very easy to understand why Tracy's family haven't entirely abandoned hope that these two might find their way back to one another.
Freddie Fox makes his musical theatre debut as reporter Mike Connor and you'd genuinely never know it was his first time. He's charismatic, funny and completely at ease with the musical numbers. His relationship with fellow journalist Liz Imbrie, played by Carly Mercedes Dyer, provides another enjoyable dynamic, with Dyer's performance of I've Got You Under My Skin being one of my musical highlights of the evening.
The supporting cast is equally strong. Nigel Lindsay is hilarious as gin-loving Uncle Willie and gets one of the evening's most entertaining numbers with Now You Has Jazz, while Naomi Pacquette makes Tracy's younger sister Dinah wonderfully precocious.
Visually, the set perfectly captures the wealth and elegance of Tracy’s world, while remaining flexible enough for the story to move seamlessly between locations. Two standout moments for me were the night-time tree lit with fairy lights and the pool scenes, both of which looked stunning on stage.
High Society isn't trying to offer an evening of profound drama. It's champagne, jazz, beautiful costumes, romantic complications and wealthy people behaving increasingly badly, and sometimes that's exactly what you want from a night at the theatre.
The traditional Hollywood-style ending ties everything together exactly as expected, but anything else would feel completely wrong for a production that embraces its old-fashioned charm so wholeheartedly.
High Society runs at Leeds Grand Theatre from the 25th August 2026 to the 29th of August 2026. Tickets can be purchased here.
