Here Comes J. Edgar - Review

King's Head, London

*****

Music by Peter Matz

Lyrics & book by Harry Shearer and Tom Leopold

Directed by Josh Seymour

Marc Elliott and Bryan Batt

Here Comes J. Edgar makes its world premiere at London’s King’s Head Theatre this week, some 30 years after it was written. This sparkling satire has a remarkable pedigree with book and lyrics penned by LA’s masters of comedy Harry Shearer and Tom Leopold and a stunning score composed by the equally gifted Peter Matz who was to tragically pass away in 2002.

The titular J. Edgar is of course the USA’s J. Edgar Hoover who served as the director of that nation’s Bureau of Investigation for 11 years from 1924, before changing its name to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (the FBI) and remaining in post for a remarkable 37 further years. It has been recognised that the vast amount of surveillance information that Hoover had amassed over the years, including compromising information on all of the Presidents that he served under, went a long way to assist him in corruptly keeping his job for such an inordinately long period of time.

Hoover’s alleged corruption went much further than just holding onto his job for 48 years. The vast extent of the secrets held in his files enabled him to abuse his powers, largely at whim, enabling him to persecute and manipulate politicians, celebrities, activists and ordinary citizens. Tasked with tackling the spread of communism, his association with Senator Joe McCarthy was frightening.

It was however in his approach to matters sexual that Hoover’s hypocrisy was most apparent and Shearer, Leopold and Matz mercilessly mine this rich seam of his life to deliver the sharpest historical satire around.

Hoover never married and was widely believed to be gay – developing over the years a very close association with his assistant Clyde Tolson.  The show opens (and closes) with the dying Hoover on his hospital bed, before delivering a whistle-stop tour through Hoover’s life touching upon a handful of the eight presidents that he was to serve under, from Coolidge through to Nixon.

Mad Men’s Bryan Batt makes a terrific London stage debut in the title role. Capturing the vain, egomaniacal Hoover, Batt’s presence is convincing – and boy can he hold a note too. Wickedly exploring his character’s sexual proclivities, including an inspired dalliance with transvestism, Batt’s performance cuts through the evening like a hoover at a glitter convention.

The King’s Head maybe one of the capital’s fringe venues, but the production values that underscore this show are breathtaking. Alongside Batt, the key principal players include Hugo Bolton as Tolson and Marc Elliott as Walter Winchell, a fading Entertainments Journalist who forges a symbiotic relationship with Hoover, both feeding each other the titbits of scandal they need to survive.

Laura Medforth plays Helen, Hoover’s devoted secretary at the Bureau, while Lucy O’Byrne plays the ghost of Hoover’s long departed mother. Medforth’s and O’Byrne’s vocal work is simply sensational. Equally sharp, albeit in a very brief cameo, is Judith Owen as the Madam of a brothel, tasked with the entrapment of Public Enemy Number One, gangster John Dillinger.

Josh Seymour directs his glorious company at a pace while leading choreographer Bill Deamer, a man more accustomed to the West End’s more glamorous stages, arranges routines that are stunningly executed within the venue’s compact space. And in the show’s closing act, the routine that has a quartet of Presidents ( chronologically FDR, Ike, JFK and LBJ) regretting that they had never acted more decisively to remove Hoover from his post is theatrical magic. 

The genius underlying the construction of this show is breathtaking. Matz’s music deliberately pastiches some Broadway greats – listen out for the nods to Guys & Dolls and West Side Story – with his tunes, often in musical snatches lasting barely a few seconds, covering a wide spectrum of genres. Perched high above the stage, Luke Holman deftly directs the show's small band. 

This is musical theatre at its best. Sharply, hilariously written and faultlessly performed. For those not easily offended, it’s unmissable.

Runs until 16th August

Photo credit: Mark Douet

Sweet Charity (at Nottingham Playhouse) - Review

Nottingham Playhouse, Nottingham



****



Music by Cy Coleman
Lyrics by Dorothy Fields
Book by Neil Simon
Directed by Bill Buckhurst

Rebecca Trehearn and Ensemble

As Bill Buckhurst’s production of Sweet Charity takes the show squarely back to its 1960s origins with Rebecca Trehearn in the lead, the show delivers an exhilarating if somewhat brutal comment on humanity that proves disarmingly timeless.

Trehearn’s Charity is as kooky as the role demands – and yet driving her character is the same honest energy that Julia Roberts’ Anna showed in the movie Notting Hill. Charity is just a girl asking a boy to love her, and it is a mark of the genius of the recently departed Neil Simon, that his book has us believe in its commonplace heroine’s remarkable journey.

The show revolves around Charity and her fellow taxi-dancers at the Fandango Ballroom, earning a buck as they are paid to dance with sleazy punters. Amidst the Fandango’s glitter, there’s little real sparkle to this life but again, it is Simon’s scalpel-like incisiveness that teases out the pearls of humanity that exist in this New York dive. Buckhurst, with choreographer Alistair David, offers up a scorching interpretation of the old yarn. The show’s most famous number, Big Spender has long been associated with Shirley Bassey’s razzmatazz, a song that is an adulation of a man with power and money (sounds familiar, no?). Here however, the brashness is reduced to subtly jarring cascades of both movement and harmonics, underlining the truth that there really is no glamour whatsoever amidst the men who visit the Fandango Ballroom. Buckhurst’s Big Spender is more chilling than thrilling – an inspired move.

Driving the show is an immensely talented cast and crew. Trehearn brings an exhilarating confidence to Charity, inhibiting the role with song and dance that is perfectly performed. At her finest with the big solos of If My Friends Could See Me Now and, a Dolly Levi-esque I’m A Brass Band, she is a whirl of relentless energy and talent.

Charity's two love interests come from Jeremy Secomb’s wonderfully hammed-up Italian movie star Vittorio Vidal and the far more complex Oscar Lindquist (Marc Elliott). While Vidal is a two dimensional screen idol, it says much for Secomb that he still brings moments of rich empathy to the role along with vocal majesty to his one big number Too Many Tomorrows. Elliott has a much tougher nut to crack with Oscar’s inadequate everyman. If one thinks of The Producers’ Leo Bloom, or (from many years ago) Woody Allen’s countless neuroses-fuelled New Yorkers, Elliott delivers a sharply observed interpretation of a man who is ultimately a hopeless, cowardly failure.

And the supporting roles are a treat too – Amy Ellen Richardson and Carly Mercedes Dyer (taxi-dancers) offer up a gorgeous two-part harmony with Baby, Dream Your Dream, also impressively leading the Fandango girls in Big Spender, as Leah West puts in a neat turn as Vidal's manipulative lover, Ursula.

The show has its brief moments of hilarity. Shaq Taylor kicking off the second half with The Rhythm Of Life is just pure theatrical joy – showcased brilliantly by takis’ arches – while the act closes with brilliant work (again) from Carl Sanderson’s Herman singing I Love To Sing At Weddings. Across the show, Caroline Humphris' deliciously brass-heavy band perched cleverly atop both sides of the stage, are magnificent.

It has been some years since the Nottingham Playhouse staged a full blown Broadway show – Sweet Charity places the venue firmly back on the map of the nation’s musical theatre hotspots.

Runs until 22nd September

City of Angels - Review

Donmar Warehouse, London

*****

Music by Cy Coleman

Lyrics by David Zippel

Book by Larry Gelbart

Directed by Josie Rourke

Rosalie Craig in rehearsal

It's more than 20 years since City Of Angels last played in the West End and it is a mark of panache that sees the Donmar reviving it now. An unconventional tale, mixing morality with the darker side of Hollywood's film-noir era, but for this particular production with a shortish run, a million-dollar cast and production values to match, tickets to the Donmar are like gold dust.

Hadley Fraser is Stine, a writer contracted to monstrous mogul Buddy Fidler's studios. Sat at his Corona typewriter, Stine taps out his pulp fiction screenplay City Of Angels, a mystery of murder and double crossing that centres upon the investigations of fictional gumshoe Stone. All of Stine's movie characters are modelled upon the people who share his world, with a feature of the musical's book being that the actors who play Stine's contemporaries mirror their roles in Stone's fictional existence. With one key exception: although Stone is the writer's alter-ego, he is played by Tam Mutu, in a role that sees the detective slowly usurping his creator's influence. Fraser and Mutu, both giants of their generation in musical theatre, are flawless as the protagonists inhabiting their parallel worlds. The irony as Stine stamps on Stone at the end of act one in the glorious You're Nothing Without Me, a message so brilliantly reinforced by clever projections, is slickly mirrored in the show's closing number I'm Nothing Without You.

The acting is perfect throughout. Rebecca Trehearn smoulders as secretary / other-woman in both worlds and sings sensationally, first in a striking duet with Rosalie Craig's Gabby, What You Don't Know About Women and later stealing the show with You Can Always Count On Me. Flame haired Craig stuns too, with her With Every Breath I Take a fabulous act one solo. The production's list of talent is endless. Samantha Barks pops up (literally) in Stone's bed, singing as beautifully as her looks are deliciously provocative, whilst the show's humour is never bettered than in Marc Elliott's Latin detective Munoz's number All Ya Have To Do Is Wait.

Peter Polycarpou has been busy building a reputation as the master of middle-aged Americana, with his Hines (Pajama Game) and Nathan Detroit (Guys and Dolls) proving to be recent comic delights of the canon. He surpasses himself here, both as Fidler and fictional producer Irwin. Whether it be with trousers round his ankles or cigar wedged firmly between his teeth, Polycarpou is a master.

Josie Rourke directs her first musical with an assured touch that showcases the hallmark precision of the Donmar's Artistic Director. The gorgeously voiced backing ensemble of the Angel City Four (who also play the various serving roles in the LA locations and who include the sensational Sandra Marvin) are black. In a show set some years before the (partial) emancipation that the Civil Rights movement was to yield, Rourke subtly layers her production with a tacit acknowledgment of Tinseltown's racism. Stephen Mear's inspired choreography pushes this exposition just a little further, with his work in particular on Ev’rybody's Gotta Be Somewhere and the song’s underlying theme of the resentment of white privilege proving another example of this dance supremo's excellence.

(read my recent interview with Stephen Mear here)

The Donmar's space is famously, deliciously, tiny. By early into act two the fake stage smoke has been replaced with a rich fug of cigar smoke, filling the auditorium and only adding to the authenticity. Robert Jone's set design is ingenious, with the simplicity of a scene-setting slow revolve fan cutting a swathe through a hazy spotlight beam matched only by the wizardry of Jone's CGI projections that Tardis-like expand the Donmar's confines. (The swaying palms at the Kingsley mansion are inspired!) Gareth Valentine's ten musicians, heavy on the brass and wind, extract every note of genre-laden tension and nuance from Coleman's score.

Gelbart's book is clever but it ain't perfect and there are moments when Stine's stylised "reality" is as incredible as Stone's fantasy world. But when a show is produced as perfectly as this, frankly who cares? The Donmar's City of Angels drips with world class talent. Kill to get a ticket.

Runs to 7th February 2015. The production is sold out, however the Donmar is releasing a number of Barclays Front Row each Monday and a limited number of day seats can be purchased at the box office.

Photo: Johan Persson