G&S in a Higher Bracket

The problem with coming up with a cracking idea on the theatre fringe is you’re obliged to repeat it – building, for example, on the brilliance of the original all-male Pirates of Penzance, Sasha Regan producer-director at the Union polished the Mikado and glorious Iolanthe to undeniably fresh brilliance.

It’s fortunate there are a dozen such comic operas in the repertoire because with the successful staging of Patience, she’ll need several more to meet demand: my money’s on Pinafore.

This Patience looks and sounds delightful. It’s set and lit with the Union’s usual home-made charm, and again Drew McOnie demonstrates his extraordinarily intuitive and modern choreographic range in designing movement which matches the humour and dexterous diction of G&S without bursting into production numbers.

The story satirises the aestheticism movement of the late 19th century and suggests young ladies are most attracted to willowy men who spout poetry rather than rough-shouldered soldiery. Both are exceptionally well-rendered in the cast – among the ‘ladies’ who are amazingly able to sing to the top of their soprano range in full voice rather than strained falsetto, Edward Charles Bernstone is a tuneful and pert Patience but it’s James Lacey with the affecting kiss-curl who stands out as the most effective head girl of the “twenty love-sick maidens”.

Demonstrating the richness of vocal talent in London, only a couple of the singers are veterans of previous Union productions, and the brilliant new finds sourced by casting director Adam Lewis Ford include Lacey and Bernstone and an outstanding lyric baritone in Stiofán O’Doherty as Grosvenor, the boy who by switching from aesthete to ordinary, and by eschewing a pair of spray-on white jodhpurs even Mr Darcy might have reconsidered - eventually turns Patience’s head.

Every element is beautifully realised, the ensemble is excellent, and the singing impeccable. If there’s a flaw, it’s that Patience simply isn’t G&S’s strongest piece, and apart from one once wrestled into submission by Dame Hilda Bracket, there’s hardly a familiar tune.


this review written for www.remotegoat.co.uk

Twentieth Century. Limited.

Desperately trying to resuscitate his career and escape Chicago creditors, theatrical impresario Oscar Jaffee hops the Twentieth Century streamliner train for New York. In the next door sleeper resides his former muse turned Hollywood superstar Lily Garland.

In the 1978 Broadway and 1980 London productions there was orchestral sweep and solid grandeur in the fittings of the train, the jazz age costumes, and the panorama of scenery and effects as ‘in flight across the night America the beautiful rolls by’. This fitted with the witty script and inventiveness of the Betty Comden and Adolph Green lyrics, in what would be their last major success crowning a career stretching back to Singin’ in the Rain and On The Town. Written the year before the popular musical was shape-shifted for ever by Sweeney Todd and Evita, On The Twentieth Century belongs in that ‘last great traditional book musical’ category and still needs the production values of its genre.

Ryan McBryde’s production at the Union follows another superb Comden and Green show, Bells Are Ringing, and invites unfortunate contrast. Whereas Bells looked ready for an immediate West End transfer (and may yet make the leap when theatres come free in the spring) Twentieth Century serves more as a memo to producers with deeper pockets to say what a great script and brilliant Cy (Sweet Charity) Coleman score it has.

Unfortunately not in the hands of this band where a misguided MD has set it for five saxophones and a piano, thereby burying one of the best and most symphonically seamless overtures in musical theatre.

Not that the performances are poor - quite the reverse - Rebecca Vere shines as Lily and sings both the operetta and the show tunes with class, although Kathryn Evans in the 1997 chamber production at the Bridewell was more overtly comic. Valda Aviks infuses the mad philanthropist Mrs Primrose with charm and cunning and her appearances are all a delight. The ironic casting of diminutive Howard Samuels as the towering knight of Broadway Oscar Jaffee may test you more. He’s funny and sings accurately but something powerful was missing, at least from the preview performance.

Since the original boasted a cast of about 45, it’s hard to believe this is performed by just 11 because they really do fill the stage with all the principals sharing the roles of the ensemble and managing some glorious harmonies in their unmiked singing. With the inevitable doubling and trebling some of the smaller characterizations are necessarily a bit cartoony, but as Jaffe’s longsuffering henchmen, Matt Harrop and particularly the Captain Pugwash-like Chris David Storer are first rate.

The scant set and indifferent lighting show up the shabbiness of the venue, and the confines of a train don’t really allow for elaborate dance choreography, although Drew McOnie’s movement and staging was well-executed by the enthusiastic cast. The home made special effects, including a shoe-brush-on-tea-tray steam train, and torch lit transfiguration, are superb.

At Tuesday’s opening, I was thrilled to discover that The Stage critic Mark Shenton is as big a fan of this musical as I am, although PaulinLondon felt Shenton was somewhat better at suppressing his desire to sing along.

It ran 2 hours 45. The show needs tightening and if licensing allows, judicious cuts.


This review written for Londonist.com

We are dainty little (6ft) fairies ...

SASHA REGAN’S ALL-MALE IOLANTHE
Union Theatre, Southwark, London SE1

Book and lyrics: W.S. Gilbert
Music: Sir Arthur Sullivan
Director: Sasha Regan
Musical Director: Chris Mundy
Choreographer: Mark Smith
Designer: Stewart Charlesworth
Lighting: Steve Miller



Whilst The Mikado and Pirates of Penzance have had a number of recent and successful modern treatments, wresting the rest of the Gilbert and Sullivan canon from the dead hand of D’Oyly Carte and its historically reverential staging has proved more difficult, so Sasha Regan and her all-male company at the Union Theatre are to be congratulated on a production of Iolanthe which is quite so inventive and engaging.

If you need to trouble yourself with the plot – well, the ones in underwear are fairies and the ones in dressing gowns are Peers, there’s a half-breed Arcadian shepherd who becomes a member of Parliament, and a ward of court who wants to marry him, and the Lord Chancellor is married to a friend of the Queen of the Fairies who has been banished to live at the bottom of a river … it’s all too silly for words, so relax and enjoy the ride.

And a ride it is – joyous, uplifting, funny, sweet, occasionally sentimental but mostly comic with moment after moment of sheer delight in both the musicality of the performers who strive for high accuracy in their falsetto and coloratura, but mostly for a genius theatrical device which allows the young cast to drive along the story and the musical numbers without bothering to age up.

It’s smart and sharp and whilst it doesn’t emphasise the satire on politicians which Iolanthe often invites, it brings in references from Harry Potter, and Peter Pan and Narnia which make the story even more accessible, and the ensemble numbers enormously enjoyable, particularly with Mark Smith’s complex and fluid choreography.

There are some remarkable voices: Gianni Onori as Strephon the romantic lead has a Scots accent which is sometimes impenetrable in the dialogue, but his singing is elegant and tender and Matthew James Willis, an Australian tenor making his London debut is outstanding as Earl Tolloller, with impeccable diction and a richly resonant tone almost too powerful for the tiny Union theatre.

Although for me the falsetto works best in the ensemble numbers, there are some highly skilled singers among the ‘girls’ – Alan Richardson as Phyliss reaches high and clear into the soprano range and Kris Manuel, in between stealing scenes as the Geordie fairy queen, exhibits a well supported contralto, especially in the aria ‘Oh Foolish Fay’.

Production designer Stewart Charlesworth’s costumes are a highlight, well matched with the battered attic set and carefully individualized for every character in the chorus. There’s no orchestra and on one piano musical director Chris Mundy emulates everything from fairy bells to trumpeting fanfares.

This is a gorgeous evening.



This review written for www.thepublicreviews.com

Brilliant 'Bells'

When you examine the 1956 credentials of Bells Are Ringing: book by Comden and Green, score by Jule Styne near the top of his game three years before his impeccable ‘Gypsy’, originally directed by Jerome Robbins and choreographed by Fosse, and whose kooky comedienne star Judy Holliday beat Ethel Merman and Julie Andrews to the Best Actress Tony award, you wonder why on earth it hasn’t been revived much till now.

The jolly, silly plot revolves around phone operator Ella Petersen who can’t help helping her disembodied clients with advice and support, falling in love with a stalled playwright, and at the same time exposing an underworld gang which is exploiting the answering service for illegal gambling. On its slender back, however, director Paul Foster and the talented cast build a series of slick production numbers and a truly engaging romance.

Best of all, in the Judy Holliday role, is the outstanding Anna-Jane Casey. In a red-tinted crop she seems to have absorbed all Carol Burnett’s comedy skills along with the hairstyle and captures the audience’s affection from the get-go such that you’re willing her to get out there and get her man. Her singing is impeccable, too, from the wistful ‘Perfect Relationship’ and powerful ‘I’m Going Back’ to a version of ‘The Party’s Over’ that's so tremulous it could be David Milliband's theme song.

This is a strong dance show for which the Union has cleared its stage to the maximum width and, as so often in fringe venues the choreography’s cleverer and more powerful than in the West End – here in the inventive hands of Alistair David - or perhaps proximity exaggerates it as when 15-year-old Sasi Strallen’s high kicks threaten to take your eye out. The combination of acrobatics and half-staggering dance moves in the drunken party scene exhibits rare technical brilliance.

The ensemble work terrifically hard doubling and trebling roles as well as keeping the scene changes moving briskly and whilst they are typically too young for the parts they’re playing, and some of the cameos are slightly more Arts Ed than West End, it’s worth mentioning Bob Harms, Tama Phethean and particularly Marc Antolin as names to watch. Prompted by a distant memory of his unusual surname, I Googled Tama Phethean and it turns out I went to University with his aunt Ellen and directed her in Coward's 'Hay Fever' in 1973.

As Ella’s love interest, Gary Milner brings tremendous energy to the role of the lazy writer and bravely defers his character’s warmth to the last moment possible, making for a far more credible romance when it happens. Corinna Powlesland, excellent as Sue the spinsterish owner of the answering service, looks disturbingly like Princess Margaret but dying to burst into song and dance given the slightest encouragement, even watching her move a table whilst her feet ache to cha-cha is wonderful.

It’s a small theatre, and some performances are already sold out, so book now. Even if it transfers to the West End which is highly likely, you’ll kick yourself if you missed it in all its charming intimacy at the Union.

Of Thee I Sing, but not memorably

ASSASSINS

Book: John Wiedman
Music and Lyrics : Stephen Sondheim
Direction and staging : Michael Strassen
Musical Director: Michael Bradley
Lighting: Steve Miller

Reviewer: JohnnyFox
The Public Reviews Rating: [3 stars]





U.S. Presidents get a raw deal from musicals … in Kaufman and Hart's 1937 I'd Rather Be Right George M. Cohan starred as Franklin Roosevelt who despite his polio paralysis sings and dances - at least in Annie he remains confined to his wheelchair whilst the ginger moppet bawls a succession of shaky key-changes into his ear. Contemporary musical satires like Michael Friedman’s 2009 Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, or Obama: The Musical have yet to build on early promise but at least in those none of the contenders gets shot at, as do the nine (count ‘em) potential victims in Stephen Sondheim’s Assassins currently in a new production by Michael Strassen at the Union Theatre, Southwark.

Assassins is a difficult musical to pigeon-hole. Despite comparing its vengeful plot with Sweeney Todd, it doesn’t fall in to Sondheim’s tuneful-and-waspishly-witty category alongside Follies, Company and Into The Woods. Nor is it in the obscure-but-intriguing box with Pacific Overtures, Merrily We Roll Along and Sunday in the Park. Some claim that as a series of sketches about each of the assassinations, it’s more like a revue than a musical – certainly it defeats Sondheim’s ability to make comic capital out of human relationships since the nine would-be murderers in this show scarcely have one between them and losers and loners don’t make for snappy lyrics. It’s the lack of connectivity between the characters that limits the show, and leaves you feeling cheated with only 8 songs in 90 minutes (although this version runs 110 which indicates a need for tightening and cutting).

If it has a theme it’s that in modern America ‘everybody’s got the right to his dreams’ and that even achieving notoriety by killing the President, can legitimise your pathway to fame and a book deal. In this, it shares its theme of unattained dreams and a consequent ruthlessness with Mama Rose in Gypsy, but this music is as far from the pit band jollification of the Orpheum Circuit as possible. There’s a certain cleverness in the way each is matched to its assassin’s historical period whilst still belonging to the Sondheim canon, such as a Sousa March, a Bacharach-and-David styled lounge ballad, barbershop harmony or ragtime, but none can be extracted as a ‘standard’ to survive outside the musical’s context and they don’t stay in your head long enough to hum on the way home.

Despite these structural difficulties, there are some excellent individual performances and a consistently good ensemble. The whole cast sings clearly and accurately without miking, and Glyn Kerslake (as John Wilkes Booth) John Barr as Charles Guiteau (who shot President Garfield) and Leigh McDonald as Gerald Ford’s would-be assassin Sarah Jane Moore, are particularly strong.

Not all the characters are drawn in three dimensions or allowed the full range of emotions, but Nick Holder drew every ounce of humour as well as anguish from his brilliantly realistic characterisation of Sam Byck, a bankrupt salesman in a Santa Claus suit who initiated a plot to fly a 747 into the Reagan White House.

Although there’s no set save the dingy bare walls and floor of the railway arches which form the shell of the Union Theatre, costumes and lighting are of a high standard for what is essentially a low-budget profit-share production. Fresh and thoughtful orchestrations by Richard Bates give new life to the score as played by a versatile six-piece band.

Director Michael Strassen deserves great credit for the illuminated way in which the stories are presented, and for his huge versatility in staging this recondite and convoluted piece as smartly as his much-lauded production of Company in the same space last year.

But now, please - have a go at Follies.




This review written for The Public Reviews