The King and I

After bowling over Broadway and a sell-out run in London's West End, director Bartlett Sher's ('South Pacific') grand and glorious (fourth) revival of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's classic musical arrives in its original English version for the first time in Switzerland. Set in Siam (Thailand) in the early 1860s, the tale introduces the audience to the dictatorial and spoilt but kindly King, who invites the British Anna to teach English to his several wives and 77 children. He's blithely patriarchal; she stubbornly insists on being treated with respect, and a delicate, wary romance slowly flowers between them. Featuring over 50 artists and a large orchestra, this smash gives musical lovers the chance to whistle along to such happy tunes as, um, 'Whistle a Happy Tune', 'Getting to Know You' and 'Shall We Dance'.