Mrs President - Review

Charing Cross Theatre

***

Written by John Ransom Phillips

Directed by Bronagh Lagan

Keala Settle

By a curious coincidence, London’s Trafalgar Square is currently proving a theatrical shrine to Mary Todd Lincoln. As Oh, Mary! plays on Whitehall, just around the corner sees artist John Ransom Phillips’s Mrs President making a return visit to the Charing Cross Theatre, offering its own perspective on this most intriguing of First Ladies.

Remarkably, the work is not so much a piece of dramatic fiction as a (quite possibly ghost-written) authorised biography. On reading the production's programme notes we learn that the writer “..heard her [Mrs Lincoln]. She said, “I want you to tell my story”” Ransom Phillips also tells us that spirits are part of his life. But if the man is truly hearing voices then he is either mentally unwell, or alternatively and quite possibly, gifted with a truly remarkable access to the spirits of presidential wives.

A two-handler, Keala Settle is breathtaking in her take on the title role, exploring Mary Lincoln’s love for her husband and her grief at the loss of three (of four) children as well as witnessing President Lincoln’s assassination. Opposite Settle is Hal Fowler as Mathew Brady, the photographer who captured Lincoln’s portrait for the USA’s Five Dollar bill. Brady also morphs into other male characters who impacted upon Mary’s life, with his performance proving as carefully crafted as Settle’s.

Set throughout in Brady’s studio, the structure of the play (that has been 10 years in the writing) hints at a fascinating potential. But Ransom Phillips’s writing stumbles from expositional lecture (there’s an awful lot of history to cram into the evening’s one-act of 85 minutes) through to pseudo-psychodrama as he explores Mary’s tragedy. There’s a sound core to his narrative, but as a play it’s all just too inconsistent to sustain credibility.

Keala Settle’s work alone is worth the price of admission, even if Ransom Phillips’s script does not match her excellence. But if the writer can truly access the minds of America’s First Ladies, I can’t wait to see his take on Jill Biden.

Runs until 8th March

Photo credit: Pamela Raith

Beauty and the Beast a Horny Love Story - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

****

Written by Jon Bradfield and Martin Hooper

Directed by Andrew Beckett

Keanu Adolphus Johnson and Matt Kennedy

Writers Jon Bradfield and Martin Hooper have transferred the classic fairytale over the sea from France to the Scottish village of Lickmanochers. With the town of Suckmacoch nearby, the scene is perfectly set for one of the capital’s filthiest, funniest pantomimes this year.

Deliciously de-Disneyfied, and with a wonderfully improbable storyline that is best not subject to too much scrutiny, it’s no real spoiler to say that Keanu Adolphus Johnson’s gay Beast does follow the tale’s traditional path, winning the love of Matt Kennedy’s virginal Bertie.

Matthew Baldwin’s Dame Flora (she’s “easily spread”) is a blast, with an array of costumes that include a fabulous take on Angela Lansbury/Mrs Potts’s teapot. Dani Mirels (as Juno) and Laura Anna-Mead (Bonnie) provide the evening’s sapphic love interest.

As Bradfield and Hooper spoof many of the cartoon’s numbers, there’s a terrific rip-off of Belle to get things started, with a sensational Be Our Slave featuring later in the show. Quite how the narrative winds up in the North Sea (with In The Navy transformed into On An Oil Rig) is a conundrum but frankly it doesn’t matter. The dialogue is slick, sassy and coarse, with knowing theatrical nods and references to satisfy even the wisest West End Wendy. The shows production values are fab. Andrew Beckett’s direction is strengthened by David Shields’s simply sumptuous sets and Carole Todd’s imaginative choreography.

Leave the kids at home and treat yourself to a classy night out that's as camp as Christmas.

Runs until 11th January 2026

Photo credit: Steve Gregson

George Takei's Allegiance - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

*****

Music & Lyrics by Jay Kuo

Book by Marc Acito, Jay Kuo & Lorenzo Thione

Directed & Choreographed by Tara Overfield Wilkinson

Aynrand Ferrer

Making its London premiere, George Takei’s Allegiance is an inspired story that blends history and humanity together with some cracking tunes into an evening of powerful entertainment.

Takei was a young child when along with another 120,000 American citizens of Japanese heritage, he was interned as an enemy alien following the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. Allegiance explores the period through the eyes of a fictional family of Japanese Americans, with Takei taking a sidelined but critical role as Sam the family elder, looking back at his wartime experience.

If the show’s lyrics are occasionally simplistic they are more than made up for by the cleverly crafted narrative that weaves two love stories into a backdrop of honour and pride, alongside the incredulity and horror of patriotic Americans being interned for no other reason than their heritage. With a respectful acknowledgment to the slaughter of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, the show outlines a carefully-crafted observation on the United States’ complex wartime relationship with Japan.

Telly Leung plays the young Sam, magnificently convincing both in his patriotism and his love for the WASP nurse Hannah, played by Megan Gardiner. The standout performance of the night however is delivered by Aynrand Ferrer as Sam’s sister Kei. Her character is given some of the story’s most painful arcs that she absolutely smashes - alongside a singing performance that ranges from taking the Charing Cross roof off with its power, through to a softer heartbreaking intensity. Credit too to Gardiner who is as strong, albeit in a smaller but nonetheless essential role.

Jay Kuo’s melodies are an astonishing combination of styles that range from Japanese themed numbers through to dance-hall swing and which provide an ingenious snapshot of the time through its music. Delivered by Beth Jerem’s six-piece band, the compositions are a delight.

It is not often that Charing Cross stages such a gem - but Tara Overfield Wilkinson has helmed and choreographed just that. See it if you can, George Takei’s Allegiance is an outstanding work of musical theatre.

Runs until 8th April

Photo credit: Tristram Kenton

From Here To Eternity - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

****

Music by Stuart Brayson

Lyrics by Tim Rice

Book by Donald Rice and Bill Oakes

Based on the novel by James Jones

Jonathon Bentley and Desmonda Cathabel

This autumn is all about musical theatre based on movies that featured Burt Lancaster on a beach. Last month it was Local Hero at Chichester and now From Here To Eternity returns to London’s Charing Cross Theatre for a short residency in the run-up to Christmas.

This production marks the first UK revival of the Tim Rice and Stuart Brayson show, drawn from the classic film and set on Hawaii in the two weeks leading up to the Japanese attack on the US Navy at Pearl Harbour in December 1941. The power of the story derives from the pressure cookers of passion building up on the island – love, cuckoldry and honour are all at play here – that are to be swamped by the tsunami of death and destruction that rained down upon the island on December 7th.

Brett Smock directs a literally well-drilled company that offers another glimpse of London’s musical theatre fringe at its finest. Jonathon Bentley is the principled Private Prewitt, a gifted boxer who’s hanging up of his gloves and who irks his company Captain, the misogynist Holmes (Alan Turkington). The Captain’s wife Karen (Carley Stenson) finds love in the arms of company Sergeant Warden (Adam Rhys-Charles) as Prewitt falls for local prostitute Lorene (Desmonda Cathabel).

The whole affair makes for a well observed tale of humanity, sung beautifully by the aforementioned leads. In equally fine support are Eve Polycarpou as brothel-keeper Mrs Kipfer and Johnny Amies as troubled soldier Maggio.

Tim Rice’s lyrics are as ever astute takes on life. Witty and perceptive, Rice teases out the characters’ strengths and weaknesses, with The Boys Of ’41, sung as the attack on Pearl Harbour is in full spate, proving a devastating summary of war’s brutality – marred only by the unfortunate, almost invisibility, of the show’s three women who deliver it.

Nick Barstow’s arrangement and direction of his 5-piece band is classy as are Louise Rhoades-Brown’s projections, effectively capturing Karen and Warden’s passionate clinches in the Pacific surf. Equally Adam King’s lighting and Stewart J Charlesworth’s set, make good use of the theatre’s compact space to create Hawaii’s various scenescapes. Cressida Carre's choreography and Renny Krupinski's fight direction (there's a lot of fighting!) are top notch too.

Beautifully performed, From Here To Eternity makes for a tragically gorgeous evening.

Runs until 17th December

Photo credit: Alex Brenner

Amour - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

****

Music by Michel Legrand

Libretto by Didier Van Cauwelaert

English adaptation by Jeremy Sams

Adapted from Le Passe-Muraille by Marcel Aymé

The company

Michel Legrand’s Amour is a curious show, first seen in Paris in 1997 and then five years later, on Broadway where it was to run for a month or so. Curious for sure, but yet this whimsical tale of a Parisian clerk who finds himself temporarily gifted with a superhuman ability to walk through walls,lends itself perfectly to London’s Off West End theatre scene.

The tale may be implausible and Jeremy Sams’ translation of the original libretto occasionally creaks with a predictable, schoolboy simlplicity. But in the hands of Danielle Tarento’s cast and creative team, Legrand’s show is imbued with a classy charm that, like the most delicate of a French pâtissier’s mille-feuilles, is a delight to savour.

On stage virtually throughout, Gary Tushaw is the magically transformed Dusoleil, bestowing a plausible ordinariness upon his literally unbelievable character and bringing a vocal delight to the role in this sung-through piece. The object of his desire is Anna O’Byrne’s Isabelle, with the actress’ pedigree shining through every time she sings. O’Byrne brings a quality to her performance that is most usually associated with West End productions costing far more than a Charing Cross ticket, as her poise, presence and vocal delivery prove enchanting. 

To be fair all of the cast are close to flawless, with some of the ensemble's close harmony work proving sensational as they glide through Legrand’s cascading melodies. There is a fine turn from Alasdair Harvey as the jealously possessive Prosecutor and husband of Isabelle, while Claire Machin’s Whore brings the house down with her perfectly nuanced caricature. A nod too on the night of this review to Jack Reitman, understudying three minor roles brilliantly, and delivering the Doctor with an assured comedic confidence.

Tarento’s hallmarks of outstanding production values abound. Hannah Chissick’s direction is perceptive and intuitive, Adrian Gee's costumes are a treat, and in a venue where sound design can often disappoint, Andrew Johnson’s work is outstanding. Every word is crystal clear, easily heard alongside the immaculately balanced sound of Jordan Li-Smith’s also excellent 6 piece band.

While the narrative and argument may be slight, the charm of this show makes it a musical highlight of the capital's 2019 fringe scene. For lovers of quality musical theatre production, Amour is unmissable.

Runs until 20th July 2019

Photo credit: Scott Rylander

The Braille Legacy - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

**

French book and lyrics by Sébastien Lancrenon

Music by Jean-Baptiste Saudray

Translation by Ranjit Bolt

Directed by Thom Southerland

The Company

There's a magnificent story behind The Braille Legacy. Louis Braille, the blind French boy who applied himself to developing a language of tactile dots that brought literature to the sightless.

Sadly however in Thom Southerland's interpretation of this new musical, the audience are reduced to little more than les tricoteuses, witnessing a tale that could have played to heart-soaring beauty instead be guillotined to a work of crass and shallow simplicity.

The history behind Braille's struggles is inspirational, but in Lancrenon's prose and Bolt's execrable translations, any glimmer of wit or humanity is blacked out by exposition and cliché.

The acting is as good as the script allows, with Jerome Pradon, Ceili O'Connor and, as Braille himself, newcomer Jack Wolfe all making the best of a tortuous libretto. There's a beautifully voiced chorus of children representing Paris' blind youth.

But Southerland and his choreographer Lee Proud have done (and can do) far better than this. Most of Saudray's tunes lack punch, while Tim Shortall’s curious set appears to be little more than a curious revolving cube comprised of modern French Doors. 

By all means see this show to support a hard working cast and to learn a little more about the life of one of France's true cultural giants. The RNIB are on the programme too with a noble and worthy endorsement.

But while The Braille Legacy may be a passable history lesson, it's ultimately a very disappointing musical.

  

Runs until 24th June

Photo credit: Scott Rylander

Death Takes A Holiday - Review

Charing Cross Theatre


*****


Music & lyrics by Maury Yeston
Book by Thomas Meehan and Peter Stone
Based on the play La Morte in Vacanza (Death Takes A Holiday) by Alberto Casella

Chris Peluso and Zoe Doano

It is rare that a musical is presented with such exquisite elegance as Thom Southerland delivers with Death Takes A Holiday, making its European premier at the Charing Cross Theatre. The essence of Maury Yeston's musical, itself drawn from Alberto Casella's 1920s Italian play, is that of a love story spun from the finest filigree, yet, like Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, played out against a hauntingly gothic backdrop. 

The prologue sees the beautiful Grazia thrown from a speeding car in a horrific crash. Her death must surely be unavoidable but Death himself, so captivated by her beauty, spares her. Intrigued by the mysteries of humanity, whose lives he has claimed and stalked over the centuries, for one weekend only Death grants himself two days of mortality. Assuming the identity of a Russian Prince, he visits Grazia's home as an unexpected house guest and what follows is quite literally a fairy tale of enchanted love and ultimate tragedy. Throughout Death's weekend vacation no-one (anywhere) dies, Grazia's family discover new depths of relationships, while Grazia herself falls in love with Death, in a passion that is as deeply doomed as it is reciprocated. 

It's a brave story to stage - for to suspend the audience's disbelief and convincingly create a world that is potentially of the darkest horror, requires nothing less than precision stagecraft. Leading the show are Zoe Doano and Chris Peluso as Grazia and Death. The two are magnificent and with both having only recently led in major West End roles, their pedigree is breathtaking. Zoano's soprano voice combines power with fragility. Her four solos are compelling and commanding, while her duet with Peluso, More And More, is a heartbreaker. Likewise Peluso, whose striking performance captures the inscrutable paradox of his weekend of humanity. We believe he is a man with the ultimate of powers and yet at the same time reduced to a childlike curiosity when confronted with that most profound and rawest aspect of humanity, the power of love.

It’s impossible not to care for nearly all of the supporting characters too. Mark Inscoe is the Duke Lamberti, Grazia's father, already mourning the recent death of his son and as the host, charged by Death not to reveal his house guest’s true identity. As he watches his daughter fall for Death's charms and knowing what could potentially await her, Inscoe's delivery of this most complex of emotional struggles adds yet another layer of tragic beauty to the plot. In a modest role Kathryn Akin's Stephanie, Grazia's mother delivers the most poignant of numbers that mourns her son with Losing Roberto, Yeston’s composition truly touching the heart.

Samuel Thomas offers another ingenious cameo as the battle-hardened fighter pilot who recognises the Russian Prince for who he really is, while James Gant's butler Fidele, offers occasional moments of well nuanced comedy that are beacons of relief along the story's bittersweet arc. There are equally weighted moments of brilliance from Anthony Cable and Gay Soper as a veteran star-crossed couple finding love, their ageing temporarily paused during the weekend's magic and from Scarlett Courtney and Helen Turner as Grazia’s contemporaries. 

The creative talent behind the show is as topnotch as the cast with Morgan Large's set proving as simple as it is wondrous. A rotating set of palazzo walls and doorways, graced by rococo chairs, ingeniously create the Lamberti home, complemented by Jonathan Lipman's period-perfect costuming, with Matt Daw's lighting proving both sinister and spectacular in equal measure. Hidden away offstage, Dean Austin's 10 piece band could easily pass for a far larger West End orchestra, such is their treatment of Yeston's soaring score.

The show deserves to be snapped up for a longer run or transfer - it really is that good, but until then rush to the Charing Cross Theatre. Death Takes A Holiday is the darkest of fairytales in a work of musical theatre that is at the very top of its game.

Runs until 4th March
Photo credit: ScottRylander

Ragtime - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London


*****


Music by Stephen Flaherty
Lyrics by Lynn Ahrens
Book by Terrence McNally
Directed by Thom Southerland

The Company of Ragtime

Yet again director Thom Southerland has assembled a virtually flawless cast and crew in his revival of Ragtime, a show that is probably Flaherty and Ahrens' finest collaboration. Terrence McNally's book, itself drawn from E.L. Doctorow's opus, casts a panoramic gaze over the USA at the turn of the 20th century and the communities that formed the melting pot of modern America.

Ragtime's narrative fills a vast canvas, though neatly focuses on three protagonists - Mother who is a fine and magnificently dignified WASP, Coalhouse Walker an African American whose gift for the piano transports him through different layers of the show's Eastern seaboard setting and Tateh, a Jewish immigrant escaping Europe's pogroms for the New World. Ostensibly their three lives are disparate and disconnected but it is the sequence of events and the interplay of the major figures of the time including Henry Ford, Emma Goldman and Harry Houdini that through imaginative (and to be fair, arguably improbable) chance and coincidence lead the lives of all to become interwoven. 

The lead performances are sensational. Ako Mitchell's Coalhouse exerts a captivating presence from the get go. Powerfully voiced and with a glint in his eye, Mitchell is as inspiring as he is moving. Gary Tushaw deftly avoids cliché as he nails the charming chutzpah of Tateh, determined to advance himself and make a life for himself and his young daughter.

Anita Louise Combe simply redefines the role of Mother. In an evening of all round excellence, two of the most stunning musical moments involve Combe - her duet with Tushaw, Our Children, is exquisite, while her take on the show's eleven o'clock number Back To Before is just spine-tingling. West End star Earl Carpenter playing Father, her husband, brings an equally mellifluous magic to his role. 

Southerland's vision remains masterful. In an actor-musician production, he creates space even amongst the full company numbers. Tom Rogers and Toots Butcher have created a set that cleverly wraps around into the old music hall's balconies, allowing a staging that is well complemented by Howard Hudson's carefully plotted lighting and Ewan Jones' ingenious choreography. Jones' routines evoke both style and period and are peppered with explosive moments of classic Vaudeville dance. 

Credit too to Mark Aspinall's orchestrations and Jordan Li-Smith's unbelievable musical direction. At times being wheeled around the stage, Li-Smith manages to play the two onstage upright pianos - which in themselves form perhaps the most imaginative car ever seen on the London stage – ingeniously, as throughout he maintains a perfectly nuanced grip on the melodies being played by his cast. Actor-muso shows are a challenge to pull off well and Li-Smith just makes it look so easy.

As the Charing Cross' Artistic Director, Ragtime marks Southerland's second stint at the helm and it is evident that his continued and longstanding creative partnership with co-producer Danielle Tarento continues to flourish. Truly, musical theatre does not get better than this.

Runs until 10th December

Photo credit: Annabel Vere & Scott Rylander 

Titanic - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London


****

Music and lyrics by Maury Yeston
Book by Peter Stone
Directed by Thom Southerland

The company of Titanic

Unlike its ill-fated namesake, Thom Southerland’s Titanic has now made a triumphant trans-Atlantic return crossing, tying up at London’s Charing Cross Theatre for a 10 week season. Acclaimed at the Southwark Playhouse three years ago and later in Toronto, this riverside reprise marks Southerland’s debut as Artistic Director at Charing Cross, with his long time muse Danielle Tarento also on board as co-producer.

Adapted for the stage by Peter Stone and Maury Yeston, the musical tells of the 1912 tragedy when the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage, sinking mid-Atlantic with the loss of more than 2,000 lives. Yeston was drawn to the project by the positive aspects of what the ship represented: Humankind’s striving after great artistic works – with his show following the very different arcs of the ship’s owners, builders, passengers and crew.

The casting for this production is, for the most part, magnificent. A fair few members of the original production have returned to reprise their roles and with Yeston’s score so beautifully conducted by Jo Cichonska, it’s not surprising. The strength of the onstage pairings such as Dudley Rogers and Judith Street as the wealthy Strauss couple or Victoria Serra and Shane McDaid’s loveable Irish runaways, Kate McGowan and Jim Farrell, make a couple of tiny casting flaws elsewhere very easy to overlook.

Serra (magnificent in the original Titanic as well as last year in Southerland’s Grand Hotel) shines as McGowan. Energetic and youthful, her larger than life personality makes her character unforgettable. Even amidst the ensemble where she plays a modest role as one of the first class passengers, Serra stands out.

There is marvellous work too from James Gant as Etches, a steward in first class. Gant plays his character with warmth, a fatherly figure to the ship’s younger crew members. Making strong choices in his acting, there isn’t a point where the audience doubts him. As the ship is sinking he attempts to gather passengers calmly, although with a fear that is physically visible, not only in his face but in his whole body. One can see that behind his calm and cool demeanour the man is truly terrified. It is a performance that is almost troubling to watch.

The accomplished Claire Machin is unsurprisingly hilarious in her role of socialite “wannabe” Alice Bean. Her timing and characterful wit on stage provides moments of light relief in the otherwise harrowing tale, partnered with Peter Prentice, who plays her husband Edgar Bean, the two have a wonderful back and forth yet amidst the bickering, their moments of tender romance are joyously believable. 

And one to watch is Luke George playing a fresh-faced and innocent 14 year old bellboy. Beautiful acting, with every choice he makes looking like that of a young child and with a vulnerability in his performance that makes you believe his age.

David Woodhead’s design is minimalistic but effective, using the basic framing of bars to create the appearance of the ocean liner's deck, with the theatre itself repainted to match the colour of the set. Looking up from the stalls, the circle resembles the Titanic’s upper deck. Throughout, Howard Hudson’s wonderful lighting only seals the nautical illusion, as Cressida Carre's choreography remains as sensitively powerful as it was three years ago.

What has been produced at Charing Cross is a gripping and beautiful production that makes for a deeply moving night at the theatre. Bravo to Tarento and Southerland for sailing Titanic back to London.

Runs until 6th August

Reviewed by Charlotte Darcy

Photo credit: Scott Rylander

Dusty - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London


*


Directed by Chris Cowey

Alison Arnopp

Dusty is a show that has attracted a huge amount of challenging press during a troubled preview run that has lasted many months. So it is a brave (and largely new) cast that step up tonight to take their bows before the press. 

To those in the audience used to an evening of well-crafted entertainment – for which London’s theatre scene both on and off West End is rightly praised, the evening is a dreadful disappointment. The glorious brass-heavy chords of Pino Donaggio’s You Don’t Have To Say You Love Me open the proceedings (always a worry when the biggest number opens a show) and from then on its downhill all the way.

Alison Arnopp tries to be an energetic lead, but Dusty she ain’t. I’ve seen better Springfield tributes. To be fair though Arnopp’s blushes are spared for much of the evening as the iconic songs are more often than not played back via poorly synched videotapes from the 60s. And when it’s not VT, the stagehands are (noisily) putting up and taking down the paraphernalia that projects a holographic Dusty. They needn’t waste their time.  

It’s not just Dusty’s technology that disappoints. The script is dire too, though maybe for a show set in the 1950s/60s, for the dialog to sound as wooden as a Crossroads episode of Crossroads was possibly intentional?

There are glimpses of human talent on stage – Whitney White’s Martha Reeves offers the evening’s one moment that comes close to spine-tingling, whilst Francesca Jackson’s Nancy, (and not so long ago, one of the BBC’s Nancys too) duetting with Arnopp in How Can I Be Sure, goes a long way to confirming Jackson’s star quality. 

But you know what? This show is gonna make its money back and then some.

Britain is (in part) a nation laden with Baby Boomer grannies who LOVE Dusty Springfield. Their failing vision may (thankfully) not allow them to spot the difference between actor and avatar, but they’ll happily hand over their hard-earned pension to let the nostalgia wash over them. Mark my words.

Now booking to 21st November

The Mikado - Review

Charing Cross Theatre, London

***

Music by Arthur Sullivan

Libretto by W.S. Gilbert

Directed by Thom Southerland

Leigh Coggins

It may not be a Christmas show, but there is still a seasonally comforting familiarity to the Gilbert and Sullivan gems that make up The Mikado. The comic opera's timeless wit alongside melodies hard wired into every educated English-person, make for a show that one cannot help but smile throughout. Thom Southerland has set the 19th century work firmly in the roaring 20's, with flappers and jazz-hands making it a Thoroughly Modern Mikado. Whilst the costumes may bizarrely range from spats and bowlers through to kimonos and a Juan Peron lookalike Mikado, everyone looks sumptuous.

Aside from costumes however there is an all-pervading air of budgetary restraint. This most clever of scores has been economically re-arranged for two pianos and notwithstanding the excellent ivory tinkling of Dean Austin and Noam Galperin, there is a timbre and a texture to Sullivan's tunes that is lost in the reduction. Vocally too and with no-one mic'd, there is an apparent gulf in ability between the actors who have an operatic background and those more usually reliant upon amplification. That Matthew Crowe's delightfully foppish Nanki-Poo is occasionally inaudible (and this from a front row seat) is unforgivable. Likewise Hugh Osborne's Ko-Ko is a treat of a characterisation, but far too often his tuneful voice lacks projection. Mark Heenehan however brings just the right amount of blustering buffoonery to the title role.

The performing excellence of this production lies with its women. Rebecca Caine's Katisha is a masterclass. Her vampish, vulnerable and (sometimes) baddy is a flawless display of perfection in her craft, her voice filling the auditorium and her presence, alongside hilarious poise and facial expression, stealing every scene. Credit too to Leigh Coggins whose Yum-Yum also belies a career history in opera and whose voice often soars (delightfully) above those of her singing partners.

There are moments of sweet genius in this Mikado. Make sure to sit near the front and revel in some wonderful songs you've known since childhood.