REVIEW: Falling Stars (Online) at the Union Theatre

Falling Stars opens with Peter Polycarpou musing down the camera about an antique shop he wandered into a couple years back. I could tell immediately we were going to be friends. He haggles for the songbook that will eventually score the show, and glimmers of the wit, talent and passion that will define Falling Stars begin to show themselves when the shop owner makes him sing for the best price. As his partner in crime, Sally Ann Triplett, makes her unmissable entrance, these glimmers burst forth into a dazzling song cycle of bygone melodies, that traverse the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Irving Berlin and Meredith Wilson. 

Cosy, is what I felt watching this show. There is something comforting about simply watching talented people be talented, especially when they are equally grateful for being watched. The enthusiasm and expertise the pair have for the music they sing through is infectious, and, you are warmly invited to revel in that excitement with them. Although boasting hugely impressive careers, there is no pretension from Polycarpou or Triplett, which leaves space for a connection that I was amazed to feel through my tv screen. I can only imagine the atmosphere there would be if I had a drink in my hand, under the warmth of the Union Theatre stage lights, with the pair talking to me in person. 

REVIEW: Whistle Down the Wind at the Union Theatre

The Union Theatre present their Christmas musical, the 1989 musical version of Whistle Down the Wind (not the Andrew Lloyd Webber one) based on the 1959 novel and 1961 film of the same name.

Cathy, Nan and Charles discover a mysterious man in their barn who they are convinced is Jesus Christ whilst the village is going crazy as there is a convict on the loose. The three children end up bringing all their friends to the barn to meet him whilst all keeping it a secret from the grown ups. In the end their father finds out about the man hiding in the barn and alerts the police however the children team up to form a barricade around the barn to stop the man being arrested, the barn gets set on fire and once distinguished the man has disappeared but there has been a cross painted on the wall. 

The story is all based around the children's belief into something they haven't any proof is true, which could be seen as a metaphor for religion as a whole. They give complete trust to this strange man who could have a dark history. 

REVIEW: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes at the Union Theatre

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes is the show that made Carol Channing a star, and London has been due a revival for quite some time. Lorelei Lee is a retired Follies girl with a secret, and a penchant for money, champagne and diamonds. The plot follows her journey to Paris, the pursuit of a tiara, and various courtiers along the way.

Jule Styne’s score is full of bold and brilliant numbers, enhanced by the additional arrangements of Musical Director Henry Brennan. His command of the score is masterful, and he and the percussionist are perfectly in sync, the sound perfectly balanced.

Abigayle Honeywill pays homage to Marilyn Monroe, and there are elements of Megan Hilty with a dash of Ellen Greene, but she is never an imitation. Her vocals pack a real lunch when required, and there is real beauty in the sad, reflective encore of Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend, another of Brennan’s contributions, which comes immediately after the glitz and glamour of the full song.

REVIEW: Hello Again at the Union Theatre

Arthur Schnitzler wrote his provocative exploration of a sexual merry go round in 1897 and each coupling was set in the same Victorian time period. It challenged the attitudes and morals of the time where class differences and status were the way of life. Michael John La Chiusa has taken the basic ten scene structure and set it to music but played with the time periods so they now span one hundred years from 1900 to 1999. In doing so he tries to update how the nature of love and lust has changed since the original play was written. With a cast of ten, each playing two scenes as in the original, Paul Callen brings this new take on the play to the small Union Theatre but it does not work.

The jumps in time periods back and forth, and references to Pearl Harbour (1942), Titanic (1912) and Vietnam war (1965), create a curious nightmarish images where the original linkages of one person in successive scenes are lost as they are replaced by similar roles linked by repeated phrases in the lyrics. The result is confusing, illogical and unsatisfactory and the only explanation appears to me to be that it is all a dream of sexual guilt by an older man in his nineties? It offers nothing by way of commentary on the way the world has changed over 100 years or the differences between love and lust. Most of the scenes seem to be loveless couplings of rather sad unappealing characters.

REVIEW: An Enemy of the People at the Union Theatre

“If the only way I can be a friend of the people is to take charge of that corruption, then I am an enemy!”

This is one of my favourite plays. The last time I saw a production of it was about five years ago, and I think every time you revisit it, it will be relevant to the time you are living in. 

Director Phil Willmott starts 2019 with three plays within an Essential Classics Season called “Enemies of the People”. It starts with Arthur Miller’s version of Henrik Ibsen’s timeless political and human play about a doctor who wants to save his town by stopping the opening of a new Spring due to his discovery of unclean waters. The Spring however is a promise of new economic life in the village, and the local mayor and soon the local newspaper’s board will do everything to stop Dr Stockmann from spreading his new-found information.