The Motive And The Cue - Review

Noel Coward Theatre, London

*****

Written by Jack Thorne

Directed by Sam Mendes

Mark Gatiss and Johnny Flynn

The National Theatre production has just decamped from the South Bank to the West End and on seeing this play for the third time, like a fine wine it has only improved with the passing of time.

Jack Thorne’s writing is beyond flawless. The perceptive sensitivity with which he pinpoints the passionate, complex relationship between Sir John Gielgud and his direction of Richard Burton in Broadway’s 1964 Hamlet is modern writing at its finest. A carefully curated confection of nuance, rage and pathos sees these two giants subject Shakespeare’s finest play to moments of the most intelligent analysis, with just a twist of heartbreaking humanity too.

Thorne’s words are brought to life by Mark Gatiss as Gielgud and Johnny Flynn as Burton, the same actors who created the roles. They were brilliant when the show opened 8 months ago and are even better now, the chemistry between the two men proving electric. Tuppence Middleton as Burton’s wife Elizabeth Taylor has equally grown into her pivotal role.

Es Devlin’s intriguing set design has transferred well from the Lyttleton - however its automation at the Noel Coward is a tad noisy, that at times is a small distraction.

The Motive And The Cue remains essential drama, exquisitely performed. Unmissable.

Click here to read my May 2023 review of the show's opening at the National Theatre

Runs until 23rd March 2024

Photo credit: Mark Douet

Dear England - Review

Olivier Theatre, London

****

Written by James Graham

Directed by Rupert Goold

Joseph Fiennes

In 1981 Bill Shankly the legendary manager of Liverpool football club famously said:  “Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I don’t like that attitude. I can assure them it is much more serious than that.”

Bear that quote in mind when seeing James Graham's new play Dear England which is based around England manager Gareth Southgate and takes its title from the letter that Southgate, the manager of the England football team, addressed to the country in 2021 on the eve of that year’s European Championship Finals. In the same tournament some 25 years previously, Southgate had (in)famously missed his kick in the penalty shootout against Germany. But when country called in 2016 he returned to the national team as manager, coaching his players to greater achievement than previous international squads had accomplished in decades.

Graham’s ability to spot the dramatic potential of this nation’s highs and lows is unsurpassed, and this play, with his commentary on England and its relationship with the beautiful game, makes for an evening of mostly sparkling, funny and well observed entertainment. 

Joseph Fiennes steps up to the spot as Southgate, visually capturing the essence of the man. Vocally however, he never quite nails his character’s Crawley twang and early in the first act (for this is a play with two halves) he sounds a little too much like Michael Crawford’s comic creation Frank Spencer. Fiennes is however compelling as we see him batting his post-1996 inner demons and channelling that energy into motivating his young players.

There are some outstanding supporting performances on offer. For a show that sports a cast list packed with recognisable characters, Gunnar Cauthery’s take on BBC pundit Gary Lineker hits the back of the net. Likewise Will Close scores an absolute blinder with his awkward and gangly England captain, Harry Kane. We laugh at the brilliance of Close’s work, his performance capturing Kane’s apparent inarticulacy as a man to whom words do not come easy and whose gift lies in his ability to kick a ball. It is a mildly shaming moment for the audience when later on in the second half Kane reveals that he is aware that people laugh at how he speaks. On moments such as these is great drama constructed, where not only the great and the good are lampooned, but also those who have paid to buy a ticket to the theatre are themselves the subject of its wrath. 

Yet again, Es Devlin stuns a National audience with her visionary stage design. Devlin’s inspired use of concentric revolves, rotating  underneath Ash J Woodward’s projections that themselves  range from  displaying the world’s stadia to penalty shootout scores has to be seen to be believed. In a production of such world class stagecraft however, some of the wigs and hair coverings are frankly appalling. With the level of creative talent available to the National, some of the wig work (those of Sven-Göran Eriksson and Gianni Infantino in particular) is disgraceful.

Graham’s writing ranges from profoundly perceptive to occasional bursts of politics that belie a shallow bias. His dialogue lauds the players’ taking of the knee in the 2022 Qatar World Cup, but is silent on the slavery and hundreds of worker deaths that went into the construction of that tournament’s venues, a myopia that detracts from the play’s otherwise overarching brilliance.

Always with an eye to what will make a fine theatrical event, Graham has chosen an impressive backdrop of football anthems as his soundtrack. Listen out for The Verve, Fat Les and even Neil Diamond and dream of Dear England, The Musical.

No doubt producers and writers are already hard at work, transforming Dear England for its inevitable transition to the screen and when that happens, with a few edits here and there, it will make a great movie. Until then, catch it if you can at the National.

Football as a matter of life and death? It is much more serious than that.

Runs until 11th August

Photo credit: Marc Brenner

The Motive and the Cue - Review

National Theatre, London

*****

Written by Jack Thorne

Directed by Sam Mendes

Mark Gatiss and Johnny Flynn

Jack Thorne’s new play is one of those rare events, fusing the strongest of stories with an exquisite script, delivered by a riveting troupe of actors. The Motive and the Cue takes an ingenious delve into the rehearsals that underscored Richard Burton’s 1964 Hamlet on Broadway, a production that was directed by Sir John Gielgud.

Burton was at the peak of his hell-raising career, while Sir John, arguably the finest Shakespearean performer of his generation was already past his zenith. Johnny Flynn and Mark Gatiss play Burton and Gielgud respectively and their take on both of these giants is nothing short of remarkable. Vocally and physically the actors capture the instantly recognisable characteristics of both men: Gatiss bringing a balding mellifluous wisdom to the theatrical knight, while Flynn wields a louche, perfectly pitched swagger that, with just a hint of Welsh tonality, nails Burton’s distinctive presence.

Johnny Flynn

Thorne’s genius is in crafting the theatrical history of what was to become Broadway’s longest-running Hamlet ever, into a standalone dramatic gem. Tuppence Middleton plays Elizabeth Taylor - 1964 saw the Burton / Taylor marriage at its most passionate, remember that their legendary Cleopatra movie had only opened the year before  - and her take on the actress, describing Burton as “the finest actor she ever went to bed with”, is inspired. Middleton's Taylor understands the Welshman’s complex roots, his impoverished childhood, nurturing and nourishing his talent. In her final scene, clad literally in fur coat and no knickers, Middleton defines the smouldering, beautiful complexity of one of the twentieth century’s most compelling actresses.

With an acute perception Thorne brings to the fore both Burton's and Gielgud's troubled pasts. Gielgud contemplating the waning of his career at the end of act one, in which having coaxed the recalcitrant Burton in Hamlet’s “Speak the speech I pray you” speech to the Players, then, solo, and as a monologue, recites the speech himself, creating a moment that evolves into one of the most heart-rending and tender scenes penned in recent years. Gatiss defines Gielgud’s melancholy with a profound and measured depth, his gauche second-act encounter with a rent boy proving equally tender.

Mark Gatiss

Flynn too offers a glimpse into the alcohol-fuelled complexities that contributed to Burton’s gargantuan stage presence. Thorne’s script and Sam Mendes’ assured direction offer up a fascinating glimpse of both men’s vulnerabilities.

There’s excellence throughout the cast, with Janie Dee as Eileen Herlie (the production’s Gertrude) and Allan Corduner as Hume Cronyn (Polonius) both in sparkling form. Rarely has Hamlet’s closet scene been played with such credible hilarity. Es Devlin works her usual magic in the play’s scenic design, with scenes ingeniously changing behind the opening and closing aperture of the Lyttleton’s curtain. Credit too to Charmian Hoare, the production's dialect coach, for capturing such aural perfection from the leading performers.

The Motive and the Cue is new writing at its finest, built upon the most fascinating of stories. It is an unmissable night of theatre.

Runs until 15th July

Photo credit: Mark Douet

The Lehman Trilogy - Review

Gillian Lynne Theatre, London

**

Written by Stefano Massini

Adapted by Ben Power

Directed by Sam Mendes

l-r Hadley Fraser, Nigel Lindsay, Michael Balogun

As a tour-de-force of theatrical skill, the National Theatre's The Lehman Trilogy, now revived at Covent Garden's Gillian Lynne Theatre has to remain one of London's highlights. The 3hr 20min opus, reflecting the transition of the american dream into a nightmare is a sublime presentation of acting skill and technical genius. Stepping into the roles of the three Lehman brothers are Nigel Lindsay as Henry, Hadley Fraser as Mayer and Michael Balogun as Emanuel.

And of course what makes this production quite such a Herculean effort for its actors is that not only are they playing the three immigrant brothers, setting up in Montgomery Alabama in the 1840s, but they are playing every other supporting role too.

Notwithstanding the actors’ excellence, matched by Es Devlin’s ingenious stage designs that have translated well to the Gillian Lynne Theatre together with Luke Halls' mesmerising video projections, the play is profoundly flawed both in its literary construct and even more so, in this particular iteration.

The Lehman Trilogy opens with scenery being constructed out of dozens of cardboard 'Bankers Boxes', items that are synonymous with the collapse of the Lehman Brothers merchant bank in the 2008 financial crisis, when news broadcasts streamed images of hundreds of the bank's employees pouring out of its offices in Canary Wharf and Wall Street carrying their personal belongings in those boxes, images that came to define the impact of the 2008 meltdown on the world's financial centres. Equally, the play’s opening presents us with the three leads, clearly dressed as observant patrician Jews, one by one getting off the boat and heading for Alabama. The three never leave the stage throughout, nor change their costumes as the years roll by. Likewise, the cardboard boxes are also on stage from start to finish.

The message is clear, an insidious antisemitic conflation permeating the entire play, that visually links Jews with sharp financial practice and corporate collapse. That this trope of an association is even then factually inaccurate, given that the Lehman brothers’ descendants lost their last familial connection with the bank in 1969 and therefore had no connection whatsoever with the Lehman corporation at the time of its collapse, is treated by Stefano Massini as little more than an inconvenient truth.

Where this production compounds racial insensitivity even further is in the casting of Michael Balogun as Emanuel Lehman. Alabama in 1844 was a slave state in the heart of America’s south. A place where, especially in the play's first act, Balogun plays a person of self-made privilege. This of course was an opportunity not afforded to Alabama’s black population at the time and in his casting, the production’s creatives and producers have shown scant acknowledgment of Alabama’s desperately troubling history of racial oppression.

The Lehman Trilogy’s 21st century stagecraft may well be state of the art and its performances, arguably, the best in town. Its ethics however, are mired in the Dark Ages.

Runs until 20th May 

Photo credit: Mark Douet

The Crucible - Review

National Theatre, London

*****

Written by Arthur Miller

Directed by Lyndsey Turner

Erin Doherty and cast of The Crucible

Arthur Miller's The Crucible was penned in 1953 as an allegory to Senator Joe McCarthy’s House Un-American Activities Committee. Miller’s work is horrifically exquisite as his drama meticulously dissects the history of the Salem witch-hunts of the late seventeenth century. This stain on the history of the pre-United States saw a toxic confluence of church and government in which the word of children, accusing their elders of witchcraft, grew into an almost unstoppable untruth in the communities of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Based on these allegations of sorcery, 19 adults were hanged, countless others imprisoned and it was not until some 20 years later that government compensation was awarded to the families of those executed or convicted. 

Miller proves himself to be not just a historian, but as this website has long recognised, a dramatist whose understanding of the human condition is virtually unmatched. Much like Shakespeare, he can offer an analysis of events that may well be hundreds of years old and give them a context that is not just timeless, but timely and chillingly relevant.

Lyndsey Turner directs a show that presents the subsidised National Theatre at its very best, with lavish production values. This is what Arts Council money should be spent on: brilliant (albeit vintage) writing; imaginative stagecraft and a luxuriously massive cast list.  Entering the auditorium Es Devlin’s stark, striking staging sets the scene with the Olivier’s magnificent thrust boxed in on three sides by a curtain of cascading water and for the thousand or so souls in the audience, there will be at least a thousand different interpretations as to what this deluge of a mise-en-scene suggests. My take on this shower-curtain is to see it as the most transient of barriers between us and history. It appears tangible but is in an instant, permeable – a powerful suggestion that there is in fact no difference between a terrible history and the world of today.

Brendan Cowell leads as John Proctor, a noble yet flawed citizen who resists the accusations of the children, calling it out for what it is. Proctor is a striking character, saintly in his principles and courage yet profoundly and fallibly human too. The detailed, complex crafting of his relationship with wife Elizabeth (Eileen Walsh) defines Miller’s writing genius.

Another gem of characterization is in Karl Johnson’s take on the curmudgeonly, upright, elderly Giles Corey, with Johnson winning our love for the defiance he displays in the face of the madness enveloping his community. Erin Doherty plays the young Abigail Williams, her excellent performance reminding us that evil actually lies not in the Devil, but in mankind. 

There isn’t a weak link in the entire cast. Rachelle Diedericks as Mary Warren has us rooting for her as she strives to swim against the tide of her peers. Nick Fletcher’s Reverend Parris defines the odious hypocrisy so often found in the clergy while Matthew Marsh as Deputy Governor Danforth, effectively the supreme head of the local judiciary is equally, marvellously, malignant in his role. Credit too to the remarkable Nathan Amzi who, in an understudy step-up so last minute that the National Theatre (disgracefully) failed to inform the audience of the cast change, played Reverend Hale so well that it was not until studying the programme later that one realised that there had been a cast change. Hale is a complex character, starting off as a “bad-guy” inquisitor who goes on to find redemption in the second act and Amzi commands our sympathies throughout.

Paul Arditti’s sound design and Tim Lutkin’s ingenious lighting plots combine to make the sensory experience of the evening nothing less than immaculate.

Many of today’s writers would do well to study Miller’s work. There is not a sloppy sentence to be found in the text and amidst much modern mediocrity, it is a breath of cold, sobering air to be presented with such genius. McCarthyism and its accompanying mob-terror may have inspired Miller, but it is a tragedy of our times that his words are so relevant in today's era of polarising culture wars and internet-fuelled cancel culture. Much as it took immense moral courage for John Proctor to face his own destiny, so too can we see modern-day heroes bravely weathering the slings and arrows of outraged, vile opposition. 

The Crucible is unmissable theatre for everyone. 

Runs until 5th November and screening live via NT Live on Thursday 26 January2023

Photo credit: Johan Persson

The Lehman Trilogy - Review

Piccadilly Theatre, London


****


Written by Stefano Massini
Adapted by Ben Power
Directed by Sam Mendes

Simon Russell Beale, Ben Miles, Adam Godley

Amidst the financial crash of 2007/08, one of the most memorable images was that of the summarily fired employees of Lehman Brothers investment bank streaming out of their offices in New York and London’s Canary Wharf, their personal possessions unceremoniously borne in those ubiquitous cardboard Bankers Boxes.

Those branded boxes form a scenic mainstay throughout Stefano Massini’s The Lehman Trilogy and in this opus of a play, that spans from the middle of the 19th century through to the early years of the 21st, the writer’s suggestions are clear. Not only were the seeds of the bank’s downfall planted at its very inception, but also that much of the responsibility for this most recent of financial calamities, lies at the feet of the three Lehman brothers who had arrived on the USA’s eastern seaboard as penniless Jewish immigrants some 160 years before.

This is an unpleasant even if unsurprising conflation, for the last surviving member of the Lehman dynasty to have actually served on the bank’s board was Bobby Lehman, a grandson of the founders and who himself had died in 1969, some 40 years prior to the bank’s collapse and hence well distanced from the decisions that led to its demise. This lapse of time however has not troubled Massini. Much as was sung in Monty Python’s Spamalot: “You won’t succeed on Broadway if you dont have any Jews”, so Massini switches Broadway for Wall Street and, like an East End mural, subtly fuels a troubling trope. 

The stagecraft on display in this 3.5 hours epic is breathtaking. Assuming all roles, genders, and ages, Simon Russell Beale, Adam Godley and Ben Miles are a tour de force of a trio. With accents that are never too laboured and Sam Mendes having focused on the tiniest of nuances in each man’s work, their performances have to be amongst the finest in town. Es Devlin’s staging is ingeniously and suggestively slick - a simple minimally furnished revolve (complete with said boxes) enveloped by Luke Halls’ wraparound video screen - but it is the three actors who convincingly convey time, place and characters as they drive the narrative from the brothers’ humble beginning as Alabama cotton traders through to their dominance of New York’s financial district.

Massini keeps the three brothers clad in European/Victorian tailcoats throughout, reflecting the costume and time of their arrival on the eastern seaboard. But while this simplicity of clothing places a dramatic requirement upon the three men to enact their respective characters through their performances - a challenge that they not only rise to, but emphatically smash - its continual presence throughout the piece only heightens the play’s subliminally uncomfortable associations. 

Taking a step back from the production’s breath-taking technical brilliance - opening now in the West End having only just returned from an acclaimed, brief, New York transfer - the quality of the writing does not match the standards of Mendes’ cast and crew. While the story revolves around (and not entirely incorrectly) the brute avarice of capitalism with the horrors of the 1929 Wall Street crash featuring heavily in the second act, the argument is one-sided and there is little if any respect paid to the positive aspects of capital markets.

For sure the markets are imperfect, often profoundly so, but it was and remains risked capital that often created national as well as private wealth and much mass employment too. But for Massini it seems that these are inconvenient truths. Similarly, the story’s vast timeline is managed well until the third act’s endgame, when the four decades following Bobby Lehman’s demise are telescoped into a barely fleshed-out finale.

Notwithstanding its flawed message, in these times of unparalleled political polarisation The Lehman Trilogy will be lapped up by eager audiences. And for sheer technical theatrical genius, the play is in a class of its own.

Runs until 31st August. To be screened via NTLive on 25 July 

Photo credit: Mark Douet

The Lehman Trilogy - Review

National Theatre, London



*****


Written by Stefano Massini
Adapted by Ben Power
Directed by Sam Mendes

Simon Russell Beale, Ben Miles and Adam Godley

The creation, rise and ultimate fall of one of the largest investment firms in the USA might not seem like the most interesting subject matter to embrace for three and a half hours, but with The Lehman Trilogy at the National Theatre Sam Mendes directs an epic and engrossing tale of three brothers over three centuries, forever foreshadowed by our knowledge of the 2008 financial crash.

The trilogy opens with ‘Part 1: Three Brothers’, with each Lehmann brother arriving on the shores of the newly prosperous USA from Rimpar in Germany and settling among the cotton plantations of Montgomery, Alabama. The impeccable Simon Russell Beale plays Henry Lehman, the oldest of the three and the chief decision maker much to the chagrin of second brother Emanuel Lehman (Ben Miles). Adam Godley completes the trio as Mayer Lehman, affectionately (and less affectionately) referred to as ‘the potato’ and the intermediary between his older brothers. The three narrate the tale and, between them, bring to life the wives, classmates, colleagues and children required to take us through their journey of growth and multiple rebrands thanks to the invention of that ineluctable staple of today’s business world: the middlemen. From cotton to coffee to Wall Street, the three performers are a masterclass in storytelling. Es Devlin’s design, a surprisingly unpretentious square, rotating, glass-laden stage; video backdrop from Luke Halls; and live tinkled ivories played by Candida Caldicot drive the action from light business banter to massive loss.

In ‘Part 2: Fathers & Sons’ the second generation of American Lehmans take the helm, with the scarily strategic Philip (Beale) pushing the business into the industrial age in much the same way he chooses a wife (marks out of 100, obviously, with Godley hilariously embodying each candidate). In this Act, the play really embraces its “The Big Short”- esque style, informing the audience as much as entertaining them, as Philip’s own son (Robert, played suavely by Godley) describes the impending shift of fortune from industry to entertainment at the beginning of the 20th Century. This style is further highlighted with the delicate balance of the ever present but unseen and fictitious tightrope walker Caprinsky as a masterly metaphor, together with the continuous comic candour that Mendes directs so well.

‘Part 3: The Immortal’ sees an interesting female finally but briefly enter the fold with the introduction of the brash Ruth Lamar from Illinois (Beale, charming), who is Bobby Lehman’s wife and partner through the crash of 1929 where Lehman Brothers’ hangs on by the skin of its teeth. The imminent downfall of the company at the beginning of the next century is underscored by the repetitive script, which is as deafening as the quite purposeful shift into consumerism which firmly earns the bank its “evil corporation” crown.

The Lehman Trilogy is an intelligent look behind the scenes of the American Dream and the smoke and mirrors of the corporate world, brought to light by Mendes’ astute direction and a stellar cast. 3.5 hours well spent.

Runs until 20th October

Reviewed by Heather Deacon

Photo credit: Mark Douet

I Can't Sing! - It's Still a Yes From Me

It is desperately sad news that I Can’t Sing! is to close at the London Palladium in two weeks time. Sad for the company, the creatives, the producers and sad too for those audiences who were booked to see it and will now be disappointed.

I declare a very modest interest in the show. I had thoroughly enjoyed it (with a 4* review here), it’s female star Cynthia Erivo had graciously taken time away from the her demanding rehearsal schedule (and shortly before she sang for The Queen) to be interviewed by me earlier this year (linked here) and I thought that Harry Hill’s brilliantly bonkers satire was sufficiently sharp, recognisable and non-offensive, for me to have booked 30 further tickets to take our office team to see the show in June.

I Can’t Sing! is a bang up to date pantomime that brilliantly lampoons an iconic populist TV show and which has been put together with production values that are excellent and expensive. Simon Cowell is to be praised for having injected millions into developing the show, a large proportion of which will have filtered down into the economy of hard working and often underpaid talented folk. Cowell had recruited the West End’s finest for his show and on a personal level for the actors, musicians and crew, nothing can make the financial pain of job-loss any easier. Sadly t’was ever thus in the fickle cut-throat world That’s Entertainment.

No-one outside of the producers could have predicted that it would depart the massive Palladium stage so soon and with a harsh two weeks’ notice for the cast at that, but as I wrote when the show opened, the writing was on the wall for an early West End closure from day one. I Can’t Sing! is a high-grade pantomime and I struggle to understand how the business genius that is Cowell (and which has now seen him ruthlessly end the show's Palladium life) could not have foreseen that a typical family, who may be used to paying around £30 a ticket (often less for kids) to see a local panto at Christmas, would struggle with finding £67.50++ each, to see his capers in the West End – and that’s before the cost of food, travel and quite possibly accommodation. I Can’t Sing! is the right show, but in the wrong theatre and at the wrong price.

It is early days to consider a future. This production’s wounds are raw and have not even yet begun to heal, but there could and should be a further lease of life for this marvellous quirky show, at least on tour. Much of its act one scenery comprises digital projections that are at the very least transportable and it shouldn’t be beyond the ken of the talented Es Devlin to re-design her cumbersome second-half trucks to something more compact.

Erivo should still be in the running for an award for her turn as Chenice. Her take on the show’s title song was nothing less than outstanding and one can only hope that come this time next year, the Olivier judges remember that she really can sing!

And at the same time as the closing notices are mourned, we should also celebrate the fact that this show was born at all. I Can’t Sing! is madcap and innovative, yet beautifully British and assembled with world-class stagecraft. The whole production team should feel proud of their artistic creation and hope that it can be shared with a wider national audience. It’s still a Yes from me.

I Can't Sing runs until May 10 2014

I Can't Sing!

Palladium, London

****

Music and lyrics by Steve Brown

Book and additional lyrics by Harry Hill

Directed by Sean Foley 

SINCE THIS REVIEW WAS PUBLISHED, I CAN'T SING! HAS ANNOUNCED THAT IT IS TO CLOSE ON MAY 10 2014

MY COMMENTS ON THAT CLOSURE ANNOUNCEMENT CAN BE FOUND HERE. 

Nigel Harman

Christmas has come early to the London Palladium as I Can't Sing! - The X Factor Musical lampoons modern Britain in a hilarious pantomime of a show. Merciless in its satirical view on Simon Cowell, the judges and all of the rituals that comprise the eponymous talent show, nor stinting in mocking itself, this is a glorious festival of frivolity, that also carries a message both about and to, a modern cynical audience.

The “boy meets girl” story may be a shallow cliché, yet around this cheesy structure, Harry Hill has crafted moments of comic brilliance. Speaking to The Stage newspaper after opening night Cowell, who has co-produced the show, says of Hill that "in TV Burp he used to take the piss out of (the X Factor) every week, but in a really fun way. He approached it with a sense of humour and observation" and it's that observation that gives this show it's bite. Contestants, hosts and celebrities are mocked perceptively, yet amongst the satire and the corny romance, there's a number in the first act sung by the show’s two lovebirds, Missing You Already, that combines honest emotion with on screen projections of the lyrics transcribed into tender text messages. It’s a clever touch that speaks to today's teenagers.

But the real strength of I Can’t Sing! lies in the human talents on and off stage. Nigel Harman's portrayal of Cowell is a brave assault on a living icon. Harman pulls it off, notably in the lavish tap number Uncomplicated Love, giving the media tycoon a strong hint of Chicago's Billy Flynn. Preposterously overstated maybe, but it works. The reality show's host, Dermot O'Leary is similarly scrutinised with Simon Bailey's brilliant Liam O'Deary being the (cynical) highlight of the evening. The heroine, Chenice, who hails from the wrong side of the tracks is accompanied everywhere by her pet dog Barlow and building upon his puppetry skills deployed in Avenue Q, Simon Lipkin animates the dog with flair and pinpoint wit. Katy Secombe (a spitting image of dad Harry) gives a cracking turn as a Susan Boyle supermarket misfit whilst playing the other half of the loving leads, Alan Morrissey puts in a credible shift as Max, a ukulele playing plumber with an alter ego as a singer songwriter.

Simon Lipkin, Cynthia Erivo, Alan Morrissey

It is however in Cynthia Erivo’s creation of Chenice, that this show has cemented the reputation of one of the West End’s newest stars. Playing a typically ditsy self-deprecating heroine who through the show learns to believe in herself, it is not until 40 minutes into the first half when Erivo sings the title number, that she displays her vocal process. Chenice is yet another stunning performance from this elegantly framed lady whose voice is sweet, rare and profoundly powerful. When she sings, she captivates and even though it is Harman’s name that tops the bill, it is Erivo who deservedly takes the final curtain call.

In many respects I Can’t Sing! is a glorious celebration of contemporary British musical theatre. Blessed with tycoon producers who have been able to invest millions in a show that notwithstanding being totally bonkers, actually strings together some good tunes, some great gags and all on a set that designer Es Devlin has been allowed to spend a fortune upon, all makes for a fun night out. It's not perfect though. Some of the writing is a tad too silly and the ending will leave jaws dropped at such a flamboyant re-definition of “ridiculous”. There is also little to appeal to foreign tourists who will be unfamiliar with the ridicule of our domestic idiosyncrasies and even more importantly, among the home market that consumes Cowell’s broadcast output, many will find the price of London tickets prohibitive. The show may well not be due the longest of runs at the Palladium, but it sure as heck deserves to tour. The regions have contributed much to Cowell’s wealth and they are entitled to this show being taken on the road.

I Cant Sing! presents a technically excellent company delivering clever and innovative work. And in Cynthia Erivo’s performance, one is surely witnessing what has to be the West End’s very own X Factor.

Now booking through 2014

American Psycho

Almeida Theatre, London

*****

Book by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa

Music and lyrics by Duncan Sheik

Based on the novel by Brett Easton Ellis

Directed by Rupert Goold

Matt Smith

Trading sonic screwdriver for shotgun, Matt Smith sheds his Dr Who persona to emerge as Patrick Bateman the damaged anti-hero of American Psycho. A bestselling and sometimes darkly comic comment upon the vacuity of the 1980's, Brett Easton Ellis’ novel was famously realised as a 2000 movie starring Christian Bale. Since then a musical version has been talked of, but it has taken until now for Rupert Goold to helm the first ever translation of an Ellis novel from page to stage.

A young and talented investment banker, Bateman is devoted to style and success, finding failure nauseating. His psyche however is complex and being surrounded by chatteringly beautiful Vogue-devoted peers, (the women in particular have a clever early ensemble number You Are What You Wear) whose pursuit of fashion or the next major deal leaves him cold, only deepens his frustrations as his actions become increasingly barbaric.

Smith represents perhaps the most inspired casting of recent years. Where the eponymous Doctor is at best semi-detached from society, Bateman’s mind is truly a world apart from his surroundings and when it comes to detachment, nobody does it better than Smith. His antic disposition early on sets him apart from his banker buddies and as his reason ebbs away, Smith perfectly captures Bateman's mental decline, never once losing focus nor resorting to cliche. His signature number Clean is a clinically chilling performance from an actor not usually associated with melody.

The company work is classy and consistent. Susannah Fielding is Evelyn, Bateman's fiancée, more focused on the carat count of her engagement ring than the slowly crumbling cognisance of her betrothed. Goold has given her a persona more often associated with a Roy Lichtenstein pop art painting. Fielding's characterisation is one of the most fleshed out depictions of a shallow two dimensional woman to be found. Cassandra Compton’s Jean, whose love for Bateman touches the very heart of the beast, has us fearing for her safety whilst gasping at her performance as during her assured solo of A Girl Before, Bateman seductively undresses her, all the time his nail gun close at hand. Amongst the men Hugh Skinner’s closeted gay Luis who mistakes a murderous grip from the homophobic Bateman as a sign of affection, delivers a recurring vulnerability that is never offered cheaply. Seasoned trouper Gillian Kirkpatrick, playing Bateman’s mother, suggests just a whiff of Hitchcock’s Mrs Bates as we seek to comprehend the complex motivation of her son.

Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa’s book takes a scalpel to Ellis' original, fashioning a carefully crafted arc that is original yet also true to source. Aguirre-Sacasa's background is in comic book creativity (his is the Vegas-bound Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark) and his eye for the graphic makes for a seamless interpretation. With music and lyrics by Spring Awakening's Duncan Sheik, the 1980’s pedigree of the show is assured. Sheik's songs are consistently concise and on point. No trite lyrics here, Bateman himself would be proud.

Es Devlin uses the compact Almeida space effectively, enhancing the minimalist set with two inspired revolves on stage left and right that stylishly shift the action from Manhattan’s high society to a Hamptons beachfront with Finn Ross’ video projections completing the illusions. The story’s violence, mostly suggested and only once depicted with extreme gore, is tastefully portrayed with Lynne Page’s choreography brilliantly depicting the (blood-free) shotgun blastings of a deranged nightclub massacre.

Whilst the story may not be timeless, some thirty years on and amidst London’s multi-million pound properties, chic eateries and an ever widening gulf between rich and poor, much of the ethos that Ellis despised lives on today. But much as Bateman takes an axe to his victims, so too will this show split critics and opinions. Not for children, nor the easily offended, American Psycho is shocking and uncomfortable theatre. Brutally inspired, brilliantly realised and stunningly performed.

Ticket details:

In one of those episodes of life imitating art, with the run already sold out and until this show transfers to the West End (which it surely must), you are more likely to score a table at New York’s fictional Dorsia restaurant than at the Almeida.

Day tickets are available until the show closes February 1, details below. Queue early and wrap up warm.

http://www.almeida.co.uk/your-visit/booking-information/american-psycho-tickets/