Manilow songs provide spectacular basis for ice special

FABULOUS, flamboyant, truly professional, all apply to this year’s Holiday on Ice spectacular, now on at Westpoint Arena near Exeter.

Inspired by the music of Barry Manilow, Olympic ice skating champion Robin Cousins, MBE, has created and choreographed Tropicana, which runs until Sunday, February 19.

International skaters make up the cast of 40, who gave a high octane performance at Exeter’s premier on Tuesday.

Russian skating duo, Darya Perminova and Evgeny Belyanin, were among the special stars and produced some scintillating lifts and jumps throughout the evening, writes Di Bowerman.

Australian-born Sarah-Yvonne Prytula is an aerialist and skater and combined the two to produce a faultless routine with hoop suspended high above the ice to Ways to Fly, a special arrangement by the show’s director of music.

Taking centre stage was British skater Lauren Taylor, 26, who turned professional in 2007 and joined Holiday on Ice as an ensemble skater, working her way up to principal skater today.

Principal male skater, Adam Kaplan from the US, produced some thrilling routines.

The show offered everything, from emotional interpretations of Mandy and the fast-moving Rock ‘n’ Roll, to a delightful Christmas number with toyshop toys coming to life.

The build up in the first half finished with Manilow’s well-known Latin number, Copacabana. Vibrant orange, purple and lime green costumes, some cleverly designed to hide ‘people’ within them, and a bar, tables and chairs as props, made this a highlight to remember. So too did the final number with female skaters dressed as shining stars.

For the first time, Holiday on Ice used a huge back projection screen, divided into squares, which cleverly hid entrances to the ice, but although the images were, in themselves, brilliant, I found they detracted from watching the performers as one couldn’t easily do both – particularly from high up in the back row.

That said, Robin Cousins can be rightly proud of this show, which deserves full houses every night. We are lucky to have Westpoint Arena to stage such events in East Devon.