Barcelona is a major West End debut for Lily Collins and Alvaro Morte but does it deliver? – review
There’s a lot of hype surrounding Barcelona and it’s easy to see why. Bringing together two well-known TV stars in Lily Collins (the titular Emily in hit series Emily in Paris) and Alvaro Morte (The Professor in Money Heist) in a major West End theatre, and with award-winning director Lynette Linton at the helm, expectations are understandably very high.
So how does this play, from writer Bess Wohl, stack up? It starts promisingly – our pair make quite an entrance, stumbling into an apartment after a boozy night out, laughing, snogging and fumbling their way around the kitchen.
After a few minutes, however, it all falls rather oddly flat and never really picks up the pace again. Barcelona tells the story of American tourist Irene (Lily Collins) and Spanish local Manuel (Alvaro Morte) and shows us what happens next, after the pair meet in a tapas bar.
It sounds like it could be quite exciting, but it never quite reaches that potential – it’s not without its moments, but it does feel somewhat lacking.
