Thanks very much for that. Sounds great!

Why aren't they advertising it more though?

I doubt it's anything to do with T&D. Maybe they just preferred to do their own show? Besides, COI have the Russian professionals.

You could be right there.... there have been a few "issues" with the Ice Party shows in the last couple of years, such as celebs being booked and then dropping out last minute. Part of me wonders if the likes of Matt and Brianne got fed up of it and decided to go it alone instead?

Kyran Bracken has organised an 'Ice Party' for the last few years! By all accounts it's gone down well. Maybe he loved ice skating so much and doing the tour after he'd been in DOI that he wanted to carry on. There are some good people signed up for it and I for one would be more than happy to go and see it.

Has 'Ice Party' gone down well? They have had some problems with some of their celebs. I know that Chris Fountain didn't turn up for one of his shows last year.

I don't think you can judge purely on the problems of one year. Although I concede he had issues with Laura the previous year too.

I don't think you can actually rip Kyran apart for that as such because things do happen I guess people have turned up for the DOI tour to find certain celebs have suddenly not been on IIRC from reading on here Jennifer Ellison was missing at one point on last years tour, Gaynor when she toured and hurt herself was missing second half so these thing sometimes do have to be accepted.

Also there is usually the disclaimer the management reserves the right to change the programme, performers etc without notice or words to that effect. In fairness to Kyran I believe and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong but when it was found out that Chris would not be at the afternoon show people were given the opportunity to change their tickets to the evening performance.

Prior to that I believe Ice Party had been going down well it seemed to well attended over the years and certainly used to have a good variety of performance like all shows attendances will have suffered due to people not having so much disposible income.

I think it is risky having 2 very similar shows on the go at the same time as there will be split loyalties and depending on how is in each people may want to go to both but not be able to afford to do it.

I know someone who went and wasn't offered to change their tickets, so that is wrong. There wasn't even an apology or announcement about Chris Fountain's non-appearance either. Very bad! And bear in mind, his name was on the tickets as a Headline Act for that show. There was no announcement or apology about Laura either. No wonder some people lost faith in the show!

DOI did announce the non-appearance of celebs, so they did exactly what they should have.

People who bought tickets in advance were phoned and offered to swap to the evening show, there were notices in the Arena and info desk at Pleasure Beach informing people that Chris wouldn't be there in the afternoon, also witnessed staff telling people who were buying tickets that he wasn't there and advising them to buy tickets for night show instead.
I was at the show and Kyran DID announce about Chris during the show and apologised for his absence.

Well on the Ice Party facebook page someone posted to say that they had been called to say about Chris not doing the afternoon show and that was 30 October so a few days before the show was due to take place and there was also a post from the page itself the next day stating that tickets could be changed to the evening performance when he would be there. I remember it being odd at the time because it is unusual to actually call people to notify them.

So actually Ice Party did do things correctly technically they didn't even need to phone people they could have just put signs up on the day and they certainly didn't need to offer to change peoples tickets. As I say the management reserves the right to change whatever and in this case they changed Chris to I think it was Dan and Karen that they brought in for an extra show.

While it's good that they're trying to do something to fill the void, I don't see this quite having the same pulling power as DOI, though I do very much like the look of the professionals show, I've kind of come to realise that it's actually much better watching the true experts at ice skating rather than just a bunch of second rate celebrities.

I do really enjoy watching the celebrities skating - particularly the likes of Matthew Wolfenden and Ray Quinn who are excellent - but I agree that without the pro skaters it would be a bit flat. I think the Celebrities On Ice would be let down if the celebs don't skate with their pro partners from DOI, which I'm fully expecting to be the case... certainly Brianne isn't likely to be involved as she's doing the Professionals tour instead.

I wasn't there, but my friend who was didn't hear any announcement. Maybe they missed it, I don't know. Their ticket was bought well in advance too, and they didn't bother looking for notices. Went straight to the show and was not told about Chris.

As for phoning people, you are WRONG. In no way was my friend contacted, believe me!

They didn't do things correctly, as Chris' name was on the ticket. It should have been HIS show. He wasn't meant to be just a member of the cast, in which case they wouldn't need to have phoned people. But they didn't phone everyone in any case, as I have said several times.

Well as I say go and look at the Ice Party page under posts made by others and you will see the post I'm talking about it was on 30 October its possible they maybe did try to contact your friend and they missed the call i.e perhaps not in etc as I'm guessing it was Pleasure Beach that were calling people did your friend give a phone number when making the booking maybe they didn't have means of contacting everyone.

No disrespect to your friend but if they didn't look for notices then they can't say for certain that there weren't any and I certainly know when Laura wasn't performing there were notices up around the place.

So you might want to go tell the person that stated they were called that they are wrong then and well as I say Ice Party themselves responded telling people they could change their tickets so I think in this case Kyran and Pleasure Beach appear to have done all the could to let people know ahead of time.

Plus technically they didn't even have to replace Chris as such they could have just cut his number and left it at that.

Also if your friend booked her ticket well in advance as you say of course Chris's name would be on the ticket it wasn't until the week of the show that it was found out that he wasn't able to do the afternoon so how do you propose they changed the name on tickets that were printed months before? If your friend missed a call then that is not Pleasure Beaches fault as clearly they were trying to contact people otherwise why on earth would someone just post randomly on facebook about it. I don't think Pleasure Beach just make random calls to people somehow.

Personally I always think it's a bit silly to book to see any kind of show solely on the basis of 1 person or maybe that's just me. Anyone can be ill or injured at any time or not available for whatever reason. There is always a risk. I love Chris Fountain and he's a great skater but even so he would never be worth the ticket price just by himself, you'd want to be entertained by a variety of people across a 2 hour show.

If you want to see a musical then go see it but it should be based on the whole show not just because x is in it. If you want to see an ice show go see it but make sure you want to watch the whole show or a variety of people in it not just 1 skater.

So guess I'm lying then? I know the people in the contact centre and know they tried to contact as many people as possible, obviously if people weren't in then they may have missed being told hardly their fault
Also not their fault if people can't be bothered to read or listen to notices.
It clearly stated on tickets that they reserve the right to change the show and no refunds given, they tried to assist fans by giving them the chance to swap tickets if they wished, if your friend missed the notices which were easily seen then not the fault of the organisers. I knew in advance of the change by reading these notices and chose to then go to the show as wanted to see Dan and Karen again.

It was never HIS show, it was Kyran Brackens show with Chris as a guest artist performing ONE routine. His name was on the ticket for the shows they expected him to perform in as he was the GUEST nothing more.

They weren't obliged to tell anyone but tried their best in the short time they had, if people weren't in to take calls then they could hardly be expected to keep trying them all day!!

So we're lying are we?! They definitely didn't call everyone. Phones can be checked for calls you know. If you believe everything they say, then that's your problem.

How would feel if you were in a hurry to the show and had a long way to travel, and were let down? I know you're a Blackpool local, but not everyone is!

I agree with you, and they didn't go to see just 1 person. Didn't like the way they were treated all the same. Very shoddy. A " Headline Act " that couldn't be bothered to show up, with no good reason. Matthew Wolfenden was injured, and he still did his shows. Great guy!

I think you mean well, but they definitely didn't call. My friend can check for missed calls. Maybe they could have at least checked when taking tickets on admittance that people knew? Notices are easily missed when people have tickets, travelled a long way and go straight to the show. I did this myself when going to a show that Laura was supposed to be in. Can't say I missed her, but would have been nice to have been told!

Not everyone has Facebook either btw.

Anyway, to sum up, we have lost a lot of faith in Kyran Bracken's shows. I don't like it, but there you have it.

Matt did NOT skate in the shows he was replaced by Dave Vitty

I went all the way for the last tour show in Belfast one year to see Roxanne Pallett nobody from production let me know she wouldn't be there due to injury, I found out on arrival at the venue when I read one of the MANY notices informing people of this, while I was disappointed I didn't blame anyone for this these things happen and I was more concerned about her health than whining that nobody told me in advance.

No show refunds because a lead performer isn't there. West End shows have understudies, second understudies and swings and no obligation to actually produce any particular name. Kyran has the problem he may not have understudies, or be able to put someone else in, but he could cover it by having a spare routine ready to go on.No show would phone people up to tell them someone was off - they might email to tell people if the entire show was abandoned.

But he did replace him I believe he got Dan and Karen who were the headline act on the Friday night to also do the Matinee in place of Chris Fountain plus and I may be wrong but sure I heard that Kyran and Brianne skated as well to fill Chris's number so he still had a headline act and still covered the gap in the show so beyond not getting Chris those attending did not lose out in any way.

Plus as I say headline act or not it always says on these things that management reserve the right to alter the performance etc so they were covered either way.

Dan and Karen stood in for Chris.
And they did phone as many people as possible and offer a change to evening show, they didn't need to but done it as a goodwill gesture, also heard a lot of people saying it was nice to have been contacted with this offer.