A play of two halves!

Yesterday I took the little 'Memsahib' to London to celebrate the 43 years of wedded bliss with which she has endowed me (I have to be careful, I think sometimes she takes a private look at all this rubbish I write).  Instead of my 'boring stuff' I gave her the choice of two musicals, Cabaret and Mama Mia.  Somewhat to my surprise she chose Cabaret but then again, she's a shrewd woman and perhaps she guessed it was my favourite.  So, off we went on the morning train with the morning papers, arrived in Waterloo and strolled up to Covent Garden where, with incredible luck, I survived a cruise through 'Hobbs' without requiring my credit card, and on to an excellent little restaurant in Great Queen Street (and I do the jokes 'NIB'!)  After that, another stroll to Shaftesbury Avenue where we entered the faded 'glory' of the Lyric theatre and took our places in the Dress Circle. By the time the interval arrived I had high pressure steam whooshing out of every orifice! I told the little 'Memsahib' that if I was on my own I would leave and go home but as it was her treat we would stay for the second half. This we did and I must admit that it improved somewhat and right at the very end produced a terrific and terrifying theatrical image.

So what went wrong? First, I must confess that whilst I did once see the straight play version, it is the film from 1972 that sticks irrevocably in my memory and it coloured my re-action to this musical version which actually pre-dates the film.  Quite honestly, it is just not very good; the book in particular leaves the play lop-sided with virtually no reference to the Nazi menace at all in the first half, and then almost nothing else in the second.  It is this over-hanging Nazi threat which provides the real tension in what would otherwise be a rather trite story.  There is virtually no 'love interest' between Sally Bowles, a woman of no substance, and the young American writer Clifford Bradshaw.  How could there be with her as a bird-brained tart and him as a bi-sexual wimp? Instead, uneasily, the human drama shifts towards the elderly couple, Fraulein Schneider (Angela Richards) and Herr Schulz (Barry James) - both excellent and acting everyone else off the stage - but they were not given sufficient weight by the construction of the story-line.

The 'emcee' was played by Julian Clary and I confess to being curious as to how he would cope with the difficulties, particularly knowing that Joel Grey's marvellous performance in the film would be in everyone's mind. The other difficulty facing Clary I can only guess at, but based on what I have seen of him on TV, he strikes me as rather a nice man, a pleasant man, a good-natured man, and I wondered if he would reach the Satanic depths of the character.  He didn't!  His essential niceness showed through even in the sickening 'If you could see her' gorilla song (but done here as a pig).  Grey, in the film, relished that song, and who could forget his foul grimace at the end of it on "She doesn't look Jewish at all".  Dear Julian wasn't within a million miles of it.

As for the choreography (Javier de Frutos), I can only describe it as being rather RSC-like, and that is no compliment!  Recently, the RSC has taken to pointing up any bit of Shakespearean rudery by much crotch-grabbing and thrusting to ensure we get the point.  Similarly, in this production the depravity of the 'Kit Kat Klub' is over-and-over-and-0ver-emphasised by incessant grabbing of other people's crotches, breasts, bums and then some ever-so-naughty nudity.  All the boys and girls in the chorus are both handsome and attractive, in contrast to the film version in which, if I remember correctly, the chorus line was distinctly blowsey, over-weight and over-blown which added exactly the right amount of seediness to the context.  In this stage version they were all dressed in what I can only describe as homosexual kitsch.

At the very end, this production did produce one stunning theatrical moment.  Through the backdrop could be seen the flames of an oven fire with smoke seeping out from around it.  The chorus stood in a line facing it stark naked with their backs to the audience as Julian Clary delivered the final lines, then he, too, turned to join them, dropping his dressing gown, as they then all huddled together with their arms round each other's shoulders as the lights went down.  It stunned the audience to utter silence.

What a pity the rest of it wasn't up to that standard.

Comments

[Hank]

Congratulations to you and the "Memsahib'!

And many more!!!!!!!!!!

[David Duff]

Thanks, Hank, I do feel a Long Service & Good Conduct medal is in order but according to the little 'Memsahib', I'm still on basic training!

[dearieme]

Mind you, it's pretty brave to put on a play that invites comparison with such a wonderful film. Like putting on My Fair Lady.

[David Duff]

Thing is, 'DM', the musical pre-dates the film but the film is an example of Hollywood out-performing Broadway. I am waiting to receive a DVD of the film to refresh my memory of it but I don't think I will ever forget the shiver I had when all those handsome young Bavarian people in an idyllic setting began singing "Tomorrow belongs to me" - one of the great cinematic images, I think.