Report: Show & Dinner: Casino Royale - Club For Five @ Casino Helsinki (2 March 2018)

What: Show & Dinner: Casino Royale - Club For Five / Premiere
Where: Casino Helsinki, Mikonkatu 19, Helsinki, Finland
When: 2 March 2018


A friday night, 2nd of March 2018 and Casino Helsinki. This evening was full of excitement, danger and seduction: The premiere of renewed Casino Royale - show and dinner by Club For Five. A perfect timing for the premiere, the same day when Daniel Craig celebrated his 50th birthday.

GOLDFINGER

The staff of Casino Helsinki works fast and are extremely polite, even when people are rushing in and leaving their belongings to the cloakroom. If you are visiting casino for the first time, you have to show your ID card, then move to the photographing place and you will receive a Casino card. When visiting next time, it is enough to show your casino card. The age limit to casino is 18 years. There are plenty of different games in casino and 007 Travelers moved in front of Fennia Salonki and had already mood of Casino Royale, even before ordering drink called "Goldfinger".

The staff in front of Fennia Salonki guided us to our table at 7 PM. Our host Heidi Kemppinen took care of us and was very professional. Thanks for the excellent customer service!













THE SECRETS OF FENNIA SALONKI

There are seats for 150 diners in Fennia Salonki. There are beautiful pillars in the salon and the pyramid shaped ceiling is awesome.

YOU ONLY LICE TWICE!

First we got soft roll and especially tasty and nicely salted butter.

All food for the evening were just perfect. 007 Travelers tested menus "Casino Royale" and "You Only Live Twice".

Pirita's choice was a fish menu, which included white wine "Le Petit Balthazar Viognier Sauvignon Blanc" as wine recommendation by the staff and "Valmiñor Albariño" white wine with the main food.

Casino´s skagen with fennel gravad lax

Roasted white fish with oyster sauce

Lemon cake with mascarpone ice cream and rhubarb jam

Mika had a meat menu, which included "Meyer-Fonné Gentil" white wine as wine recommendation by the staff and "Ébano Viñedos y Bodegas Ébano6" red wine with the main food.

Asparagus soup with false morel mousseline

Roast lamb marinated with lavender and ramiro pepper

Tonka bean pudding with lemon and almond ice cream

Casino host Mila opened the evening.

The show and dinner lasted for the next two and a half hours and there were nice pauses between the songs and the dinner, so you were able to concentrate at show itself as well as food when the band was not performing. The dinner was great and everything worked perfectly. Big thanks to Aku, Suski and others involved!

Club For Five had renewed their Bond show and we already liked a lot about the earlier version, this one we loved!



SHOWTIME!

It was 7.30 PM when the intro video started to roll and there the band travelled around the world and they were hurrying in Casino Helsinki. We can see shadow images of the band, only Juha Viitala is missing. From the video to this world, the entrance is dashing and unexpected... but let's not reveal everything. Finally the whole band is on the stage anyway.

You could guess that Casino Royale show's name comes from Casino Royale movies. There are two of them: Casino Royale from 1967, where David Niven is James Bond and another one with same name from 2006, where Daniel Craig plays the secret agent 007.

The opening act of the evening was "Live and Let Die". After that we heard Bond theme songs from different decades and this time there was a newest Bond song "Writing's on the Wall" by Sam Smith in the track list. We heard it already as song number three and it was nicely adapted by Danny Fong.

Club For Five's show was energetic and wonderful, pure class!

Jouni Kannisto

Juha Viitala

Tuukka Haapaniemi and Maija Sariola sang a duet
"Diamonds Are Forever" as part of the medley

EEPPI & THE PENSIONERS

Maybe the most memorable moment of the evening was when Eeppi Ursin performed "Nobody Does It Better" to Leena, Eero, Mikael and Lauri who were about to retire from the company they worked. This was a really nice gesture from Club For Five band!

Eeppi Ursin

There were also dancers with the band and they also performed really entertaining acts, for example during the song "007".

Especially pleasing was when the band chatted with the audience during the pause. Nicely done, Club For Five!

Tuukka Haapaniemi

During the evening we also heard two other songs than Bond songs. Jouni Kannisto had called to Norma John band, which was Finland's last year's representative of Eurovision Song Contest, and Jouni asked if Club For Five can make their own version of their song "Blackbird". Maija Sariola's solo of that song was beautiful.

Maija Sariola

BANDITS AND A SONG OF ROGUES

Last performance of the sold out premiere night - not a Bond theme - before encore was Tuukka Haapaniemi's solo "Mustat silmät - Otshi tshornyje". This song described the idea that, if instead of Bond, the villain would come and take all the women. Lovely Tuukka and his voice was charming and was highlight of the evening!

The song list of the evening was following:

• "Live And Let Die" from "Live and Let Die" (1973)
• "GoldenEye" from "GoldenEye" (1995)
• "Writing's on the Wall" from "SPECTRE" (2015)
• Medley, which included pieces of "Goldfinger" from "Goldfinger" (1964), "Diamonds Are Forever" from "Diamonds Are Forever" (1971), "Licence to Kill" from "Licence to Kill" (1989), "Thunderball" from "Thunderball" (1965) and "Skyfall" from "Skyfall" (2012)
• "You Only Live Twice" from "You Only Live Twice" (1967)
• "From Russia with Love" from  "From Russia with Love" (1963)
• "Skyfall" from "Skyfall" (2012)
• "James Bond Theme" from "Dr. No" (1962)
• "Tomorrow Never Dies" from "Tomorrow Never Dies" (1997)
• "007" - theme song from several movies
• "Die Another Day" from "Die Another Day" (2002)
• "You Know My Name" from "Casino Royale" (2006)
• "Blackbird"
• "Nobody Does It Better" from "The Spy Who Loved Me" (1977)
• "Mustat silmät - Otshi tshornyje"
• "Another Way to Die" from "Quantum of Solace" (2008)

Casino Helsinki and Club For Five really gave the audience a good time. This show must be seen again and again! Buy your tickets here (Lippu.fi)

Thank you Club For Five and dancers

Club For Five:
They are: Maija Sariola, Susanna Lukkarinen, Jouni Kannisto, Juha Viitala ja Tuukka Haapaniemi. Susanna Lukkarinen is on maternity leave at the moment and Eeppi Ursin is her substitute.


Club For Five's homepage here.



Special thanks to: Laura Sandström ja Jere Pellinen / Casino Helsinki


Casino Helsinki homepage here

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