Kinky Boots - Review

London Coliseum, London

****

Book by Harvey Fierstein
Music and lyrics by Cyndi Lauper
Directed by Nikolai Foster

Johannes Radebe

Strutting back into the West End, Cyndi Lauper’s Kinky Boots takes up a 16-week residence at the London Coliseum. Nikolai Foster directs, stunt-casting a brace of reality TV stars with Johannes Radebe of Strictly fame playing Lola and former X-Factor champion Matt Cardle as shoemaker Charlie Price.

Set around the turn of the century and loosely based on real events, the story moves on some clever pivots. Drag queen Lola bemoans that glamorous boots for men are impossible to source, at the same time as Price’s Northampton factory is on its uppers.  Harvey Fierstein's book sprinkles a hint of fantasy over the proceedings, as his glamorous tale of the bootmaker and the queen plays out to a spectacularly sequinned happy ending.

The role marks Radebe’s debut in musical theatre and he smashes it out of the park. Immaculate footwork is a given for the South African performer (whose accent to be fair, doesn’t quite match up to his having grown up in Clacton in Essex as the story demands), however it is not just his dance, but also his vocal strength and acting that add depth and colour to a complex role.

Cardle delivers a competent cobbler but is outshone by Radebe. Vocally strong - with the duet sung by the two leads in the first act, I’m Not My Father’s Son proving to be one of the evening’s more poignantly sensitive moments - his acting at times seems strained.

Lauren, the factory girl who falls in love with the boss, is played by Courtney Bowman in a powerhouse performance. Her solo The History of Wrong Guys (another first-half banger) is simply magnificent, with Bowman sustaining impressive energy levels throughout the show. A number of smaller roles are crucial to the story’s narrative and there are marvellous contributions from Billie-Kay, Billy Roberts and Rachel Izen that keep the evening perfectly paced. On the day of this review Joshua Beswick and Rio-Blake Power played Young Charlie and Young Lola respectively, with both boys delivering delightful work.  

The show’s creative credentials are excellent. Leah Hill choregraphs the dance-heavy production with whip-smart flair and precision. Robert Jones set design ingeniously appears to crop itself with luminous borders scaling the proscenium’s height and width – and his representation of the Northampton shoe factory is ingenious. Jone’s work is well complemented by Ben Cracknell’s lighting plots. In the Coliseum’s pit, Grant Walsh directs his nine-piece band to make fine work of Lauper’s powerful score.

With sky-high heels, a full-throttle score and a star turn stealing his every scene, this Kinky Boots doesn’t just return—it kicks down the door in spectacular style.

Booking until 11th July

Photo credit: Matt Crockett

The Sound of Music - Review

Curve Theatre, Leicester

*****

Music by Richard Rodgers

Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II

Book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse

Directed by Nikolai Foster

Molly Lynch

It’s been 11 years since the Curve was filled with the sound of music but in a radically imagined and invigorating staging, Nikolai Foster delivers possibly the finest interpretation of the Broadway classic to have played on this side of the Atlantic.

Before a word has been sung, the curtain rises on Michael Taylor’s set that is truly breathtaking. The Austrian mountains have been ingeniously crafted onto the vast Curve space, complete with lofty peaks, rolling mists and a trickling stream. The Nuns sing us into the Preludium before Molly Lynch as Maria appears at the top of the mountain, singing the title number as she picks her way down the hillside. This stunning image together with Lynch's pitch-perfect vocals deliver but one of the enchanting moments that are scattered throughout the evening, as Lynch reveals new depths to Maria’s complexities.

Foster offers us an eye-popping Maria, more pop-star than postulant. Lynch may give us a guitar-driven version of My Favourite Things, yet she can still portray a young woman capable of a blisteringly humbling honesty in front of Joanna Riding’s marvellous Mother Abbess. Not only that, hers is an an intuitively empathetic and compassionate connection with the von Trapp children. Truly a performance of musical theatre genius.

Mirroring the romantic partnership of last year’s My Fair Lady at Curve, David Seadon-Young is again the story's romantic foil, this time as the handsome, widowered Captain Georg von Trapp. Whether it’s chemistry or electricity that powers the romance between him and Maria is hard to tell. Whatever - the love that emerges between the pair is palpable, with Seadon-Young mirroring Lynch’s craft in musical theatre. And his Edelweiss is a stunner.

But this show is not all about the powerhouse couple of Maria and Georg. The calibre of Foster’s company is quite simply off the scale. Joanna Riding brings a fabulous combination of wit and wisdom to the Mother Abbess. As she delivers her truly blessed voice to this most blessed of characters, her Climb Ev’ry Mountain lifts the roof off both the Abbey and the Curve.

Minal Patel’s Max Detweiler captures the man’s complexities in a fine display of compassionate pomposity and with a fine singing voice too. In one of the story’s most two-dimensional characters, Faye Brooks has the tough gig of playing Elsa Schraeder, a woman who has to manage the pain of her unreturned love for Georg. Allowed only minimal dialogue to tell her story, Brooks’s acting is first-class. And in the Captain’s household, Rachel Izen’s housekeeper Frau Schmidt is another modest gem of a performance, cleverly capturing Schmidt’s starched, matriarchal kindness.

Ebony Molina choreographs with a thoughtful flair - and in the build up to the penultimate scene's Music Festival in Salzburg where the concert hall is of course packed full of evil Nazis, there is just a hint of Springtime For Hitler in her routine to herald the arrival of the von Trapp Family Singers 

Arguably the finest brand new production to be opening in the UK this Christmas, The Sound of Music in Leicester is unmissable.

Runs until 17th January 2026

Photo credit: Marc Brenner

Fawlty Towers - The Play - Review

Apollo Theatre, London

*****

Written by John Cleese

Based on the TV series Fawlty Towers written by John Cleese & Connie Booth

Directed by Caroline Jay Ranger

The cast of Fawlty Towers - The Play

Written for television some 50 years ago and almost immediately entering the pantheon of comedy, Fawlty Towers was a work of scriptwriting genius by John Cleese and his (then) wife Connie Booth. 

Cleese himself has now adapted three of the (only 12) original TV episodes into a tightly paced show that runs for two hours including interval. The adaptation itself is a work of art, Cleese fusing those famous plotlines and gags into an ingenious confection designed to appeal to both fans and newcomers alike.

Of course the writing credentials of Fawlty Towers The Play were never in doubt. The challenge was always going to lie in the effectiveness of the on-stage resurrections of the beleaguered hotel’s iconically comic characters.

Anna-Jane Casey and Adam Jackson-Smith

Simply put, director Caroline Jay Ranger’s cast are sensational. Adam Jackson-Smith is the lugubrious hotelier Basil Fawlty, a role that many may have considered unplayable. In an immaculate combination of voice, nuance and sublime physical comedy, Jackson-Smith nails the performance with far greater skill than he manages to fix a moose’s head to a hotel wall. 

Alongside him, Anna-Jane Casey takes on the mantle of Sybil Fawlty, the other half of one of comedy’s most celebrated loveless marriages. Casey’s tone is magnificent and as the evening plays out, her portrayal of a woman who is as equally monstrous as her husband, only becomes more acid. Hemi Yeroham takes up the role of the much put-upon Manuel, the hotel’s Spanish waiter with Victoria Fox playing the maid Polly. Both recreate their characters to a tee.

But aside from those big four rocks of the Fawlty Towers series, what pushes this stage show into the stratosphere of excellence is the inspired casting of the supporting roles. It’s a breath of fresh air in these politically-correct times that Paul Nicholas’s interpretation of The Major, clearly suffering with the onset of dementia, is given such a beautifully weighted and perfectly pitched performance. Equally, Rachel Izen’s hard of hearing and cantankerous Mrs Richards (“What?”) is another comedy gem.

Paul Nicholas

Creative credits are due to Liz Ascroft’s set that cleverly captures the essence of the Torquay original, along with Kate Waters’ fight direction that has the physical slapstick honed to perfection. And Campbell Young Associates’ wig design for Sybil deserves its own Olivier Award just for looking so bloody brilliant!

This critic sat down with scepticism and left the theatre with eyes and cheeks wet from laughter. Quality comedy demands a holy trinity of first-class writing, acting genius and pinpoint timing. Fawlty Towers has all three - it’s the funniest show in town.

Runs until September 28th

Photo credit: Hugo Glendinning

Rags - Review

Park Theatre, London

****

Music by Charles Strouse

Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz

Book by Joseph Stein

Revised book by David Thompson

Directed by Bronagh Lagan

Carolyn Maitland

Rags from Stephen Schwartz and Charles Strouse is a show that is set in New York City’s Lower East Side around the turn of the 20th century. Seen through the eyes of Rebecca, a penniless seamstress straight off the boat together with her young son David, the tale largely of Manhattan’s impoverished Jewish community, but with enough references to the Jews’ Italian migrant neighbours to define it as a non-denominational commentary upon immigration.

The book is by Joseph Stein and it has long been suggested that Rags represents a sequel to his earlier Fiddler On The Roof. But where that show achieved it’s punch through simple human challenges, beautifully told, Rags is more of a melting pot of issues that, combined, lack the same emotional heft. There is a narrative here that veers too easily into cliche and this perhaps is the reason behind the show’s failure to achieve lasting Broadway success.

That being said, director Bronagh Lagan has assembled some gifted talent in her Park Theatre company with Carolyn Maitland as Rebecca driving the show. Maitland is never less than magnificent in all her work and here she both captures and stirs our hearts in her take on the beautiful, driven young mother that she plays - her solo delivery of the closing number Children Of The Wind is stunning.

Dave Willetts puts in a strong turn as the kindly Avram who takes Rebecca into his home. There is a confidence in Willetts’ performance that captures moments of complex nuance. Opposite him, is Rachel Izen’s Rachel in another genius delivery that masterfully displays understated humour finely contrasted with the wry and wise experience of a long life, fully lived. The pair’s duet of Three Sunny Rooms is a highlight.

In charge of Strouse’s compositions is musical director Joe Bunker, who not only manages half of his 8-piece band from across two lofty corners of the stage but also conducts 4 onstage actor-musos too. Credit to all the musicians - the score straddles a multitude of genres with Bunker’s band deftly delivering across the evening.

Rags may be more schmaltz than substance but in this, its London premiere as a fully staged production, it is still a fine example of off-West End musical theatre.

Runs until 8th February

Photo credit: Pamela Raith

Funny Girl - Review

Milton Keynes Theatre, Milton Keynes


*****


Music by Jule Styne
Lyrics by Bob Merrill
Book by Isobel Lennart
Revised Book by Harvey Fierstein
Directed by Michael Mayer

Sheridan Smith

Revisiting Funny Girl, now on tour after its tumultuous (but always impressive) London run that had started at the Menier Chocolate Factory, it’s almost impossible to believe how Michael Mayer had managed to stage it in that tiny space south of the river. Now, watching it in a venue several times the size, the touring production looks absolutely fabulous - cast, set and costumes with the show sounding sparkling, new and exuberant.

This timeless, true life, rags-to-riches story of a Jewish Hungarian immigrant’s talented but quirky daughter certainly captivated the midweek full house at Milton Keynes and no doubt will do so on the rest of the tour. Sheridan Smith is vibrant and happy, back on top form and absolutely owning the character of Fanny Brice that she created at the Menier. She was born to play this role!

Opposite her is Chris Peluso who the gods have blessed with a glorious voice and as gorgeous a presence.  Peluso’s Nick Arnstein is a little more serious than Darius Campbell’s London performance and isn't quite (yet) the match for Smith’s on-stage majesty. But these are very early days for this national tour, and there is every likelihood that Peluso will dig just a little deeper to more than rise to the role.

The supporting cast are fabulous with no weak links. There’s fine work (and tap dancing)from Joshua Lay’s ‘disappointed in love’ Eddie. Rachel Izen, Myra Sands and  Zoe Ann Bown are a hoot as Fanny’s mother and her friends, ladies of a certain age delighting in life and gossip. Throughout, the Ziegfeld girls look and sound stunning and alongside the ensemble boys, all dance with style and panache.

Jule Styne’s score sounds tremendous, wonderfully arranged by Alan Willams and superbly orchestrated by Chris Walker. It’s a tribute to the band to see so many of the audience stay and listen to the very end of the play out and deservedly applaud.

Credit too to Smith (and at certain future performances, her famously sensational London understudy Natasha J Barnes too) for having the gumption to go on the road with the show. All too often, a show’s headline stars can tend to drift away come tour-time, replaced by leads who whilst unquestionably excellent, lack star quality. Not so here, where Smith will be toughing out like a trouper. Brava!

Funny Girl on tour is a chance to glimpse the West End’s finest, up close. We’re all people who need people and amidst a marvellous company, Sheridan Smith continues to make this show unmissable.

Runs until 4th March - Then tours. For schedule click here. 

Reviewed by Catherine Françoise

Photo credit: Johan Persson