A Christmas Carol
Birmingham Rep, Tuesday 15 December 2009
Review by Emma Shane
©January 2010
Having very much enjoyed this
musical by Jason Carr and Bryony
Lavery at The Chichester Festival Theatre last year, I was very keen
to see Birmingham
Rep’s professional revival of it. After all it is the first time a Jason Carr musical has actually been revived.
So that makes it something special.
It is only the fourth time
I’ve ever visited Birmingham
(and the third doesn’t really count as it was on the way back from somewhere
else). I did not know before how dry the city is, with the Rep theatre being,
as far as I can gather, in one of the dry parts of the city. Fortunately Jason Carr’s songs are so thoroughly
brilliant, one does not necessarily need any distilled waters to enjoy a
performance of them.
This time, there are fewer
ghosts, but of the few there are, they are all rather more fully attired, their
costumes looking more like outer garments than undergarments. This is considerably
less distracting as the simple costumes do not draw so much attention to
themselves, and therefore our attention is more fully focused on the
performances and the piece as a whole. The result is that the opening number A
Ghost Story comes across rather better, though that could also be in
part due to my having got more used to it, having seen the show last year at Chichester. I also noticed, one line of dialog which I do
not recall being in the show before. Last year I thought the piece opened with
one of the ghosts saying “Let all the doors be locked”. However, this
year, there is definitely a line before that one, when one of the ghosts asks “How
shall it be done?” Was this an addition for the revival, I wonder? Carl
Au, as one might expect from an Arts Ed trained performer quickly
established himself as Nephew Fred, though I was disappointed that Fred did not
wear a red scarf, it had been a rather neat touch at Chichester
that Fred and Fan had the same red scarf. Hadley Fraser also comes across
reasonably well as Bob Crachit.
While in some ways it is good
to see Scrooge played by an actor who is actually the right age for the part,
with I Wish To Be Alone, it soon becomes apparent that Peter
Polycarpou isn’t as good a singer as the guys (Alfie Jones or the
wonderful Edward Eustace) who had alternated in the role at Chichester
last year (I don’t know which of those two I actually saw). Interestingly,
however, I noticed that Peter Polycarpou uses an interesting voice for the
character, one which sounds vaguely familiar. In fact it’s somewhat similar to
the voice Mak Wilson used for Farkas Faffner in The Ghost Of
Faffner Hall. I also couldn’t help noticing that the caroller, played
by Colin Ryan was here dressed as a choir boy, I felt this to be an
unnecessary distraction, though it was the only piece of poor costuming in the
entire show.. There seems to be a bit of
a trend in musicals at the moment, for getting actors who can more or less sing
but are not primarily known for singing playing major roles. On film we’ve had Johnny
Depp in Sweeney Todd, while on the London stage in the past
year we’ve had Rowan Atkinson in Oliver!, Peter Davison
in Legally Blond The Musical, and not forgetting Max Gold
in Johnny Johnson. Of course there are some advantages to using
actors who can sing a bit. In that because their singing ability is somewhat
limited, they actually focus and concentrate more on putting the song across
with simplicity and sincerity, rather than trying to do any amazing vocal
acrobatics that a more accomplished singer would be tempted to do. In this
particular instance, although Carr’s music seems a little complex for
Polycarpou’s vocal abilities, the positive side is that Polycarpou does sing
the lyrics very clearly, where as some of the more musically accomplished
performers in this production do not.
The medley of Christmas
carols which follows is not credited in the programme this time, I felt that a
shame, since it brings out Jason Carr’s
fabled ability as an arranger so well.
The contrast between actors
who can sing a bit doing their best and singer-actors doing it is made very
clear in Here In Life, sung by Russell Dixon, as Marley.
Now Russell Dixon is fairly well known for doing musicals, and one could
tell that musically is voice is much more accomplished, and yet he didn’t sing
the brilliant lyrics so clearly.
On
to meeting The Ghost Of Christmas Past, Colin Ryan does a perfectly
satisfactory job, though not as ethereal as when Ben Geering did it at Chichester. In the schoolhouse we have the first real
surprise of the evening. the Boy Scrooge is portrayed by means of rod puppet,
performed by Paul-Ryan
Carberry. He does a reasonably satisfactory job, but is clearly
inexperienced. However, for the purposes of this production that doesn’t matter
too much. There enters another puppet, Fan, performer by Vicki Lee Taylor.
I was wondering how this production could possibly match Freya Holland’s
wonderful performance last year. Yet Vicki Lee Taylor does a surprisingly
good job. The fact that she seems one of the few performers in the cast to have
had some contact with puppetry before, her television credits do include The
Sooty Show (although it’s not clear whether she’s ever helped out with
the puppeteering, but whatever her involvement with a television show like
that, it probably helped in some way. It also helps that she does a good ‘cute’
voice, the sort that is very necessary to this character. (It’s a bit like an
English version of the sort of voice Julie Atherton did for Kate Monster
in Avenue Q, which is itself clearly a good imitation of the kind
of voice used by several Sesame Street puppeteers). At Chichester
Fan and Boy Scrooge had simply sat on a box, pretending it was a carriage. But
now the two puppets are placed in a cart (with their puppeteers walking behind
it). The carriage even has a horse, only instead of the pantomime stereotype of
two stupid actors dressed up as a horse, here we only had one actor dressed
up as a horse, he actually did have a large horses head mask over his own
head. Anyway, Home For Good is a jolly romp of a song, which
Vicki does justice to (just as Freya did at Chichester).
On to my favourite song in
the piece, The Grand Fezziwig Annual Company Christmas Ball. This
song has a beautiful tune, and absolutely splendid lyrics, so it was a shame
that Sevan Stephan and Melanie La Barrie rather mangled the
gorgeous lyrics by failing to sing with any clarity. But it’d still a great
tune, very nicely played by the orchestra. By now Paul-Ryan
Carberry is acting the part of Scrooge as a young man, with Sophie Bould
as Belle.
This time The Ghost Of
Christmas Present is played by a man, Dale Meeks, and his costume is
well perhaps the one we might traditionally expect for this ghost, bearing a
slight similarity to the puppet version performed by Jerry Nelson in one
notable film, and above all of course very much a Father Christmas/SantaClaus
character. Interesting though Emily Dyble’s portrayal had been , I think
in a way perhaps sticking with tradition at this point is probably the best
thing to do (where practical). Sometimes it’s good to give an audience what it
expects. I was pleasantly surprised by Rosalie Craig’s excellent
portrayal of Mrs Cratchit. It’s a difficult part for any actress to make her
own, especially if one has seen it played on film and television by such
characters as Miss Piggy, or Roland Rat’s Mother Iris. Yet,
whatever versions of this character one has seen before, and however much
presence they’ve got, this afternoon, at least for the duration of the
performance, Rosalie Craig succeeded in making the character very much
her own. Right away in Scene 11 Chez The Cratchits she took clear
charge of the scene. And sang very well on The Christmas Goose.
In fact this number, brilliantly led by Hadley Fraser as Bob Crachit was
one of the best performed numbers in the entire show. Hadley and Rosalie led
the way, proving themselves to be really fine singers, so well suited to the
complexities of Carr’s music, and yet also brilliant actors, capable of making
their important roles very much their own. They also sing the complex,
brilliant lyrics with a little more clarity than the Chichester performers did,
though the latter did put a great deal of effort into it. The children playing
many of the younger Crachits also did well. While Tiny Tim was another rod
puppet, this time puppeteered by Colin Ryan, although I felt his
puppetry lacked a certain amount of experience. I did notice that he seemed to
connect with the puppet, acting as though he had some affection for it, I
wonder if he’s had an experience of puppets before? Possibly his work on Hounded
may have helped. It’s notable he was also trained at Arts Educational.
Onto Scene 12, at Nephew
Fred’s we also got two more splendid performances, from Carl Au as Fred,
and Paul-Ryan Carberry
doing his best work as Topper. Between them they put Yes And No
across very well indeed. Carl in particular is an excellent singer, as one
might expect from the winner of the very first Stephen Sondheim Student
Performer Of The Year Award. I was less sure about the performances of
some of the other members of Fred’s family, with particular doubts as to
whether Russell Dixon’s performance, in drag, of Great Aunt Emmeline
really did much for the show. However this is a small company, and we have to
make do with the actors we have.
With The Toast
we also have a lot of excellent performances, from Carl, Hadley and Rosalie,
which made this song come across rather better than at Chichester,
though it does also have a beautiful melody, with clever lyrics that fit it
perfectly.
Finally The Ghost Of
Christmas Past presents Scrooge with the two children Want and Ignorance, these
were two more rod puppets, this time performed by Melanie La Barrie and Vlach
Ashton. Somehow I didn’t find them particularly convincing puppeteers.,
however that could have been as much to do with the characters. There isn’t
much they could do in terms of characterisation. The act ends with smoke, and a
scared Scrooge, and there is still one more ghost yet to come.
Act 2 opens once again with the Grey Ghost, and then we
meet the final ghost Christmas Yet To Come. This is portrayed by a large
puppet, high up towards the back of the stage, and is performed rather well by Vlach
Ashton, his best performance in the show.
In The City various
characters, named after monetary terms discuss someone’s death. Most of these
characters are male, and it was interesting to note that several notable male
members of the company fitted well into a strong ensemble (Hadley Fraser
and Carl Au among them). However, I did notice that the lone female, Sophie
Bould stood out for doing a particularly good job in her little part.
At Old Joe’s Make Hay
(‘Cause Tonight You Die!) came across even more brilliantly than it did
at Chichester. Good though The Chichester
Youth Theatre are, it benefits a lot from being performed by experienced
professional grown up actors. Rosalie Craig does a particularly good job
as Mrs Dabchick. Vicki Lee Taylor is more or less satisfactory as Mrs
Dilber, certainly an improvement on the performance at Chichester,
although the character still isn’t coming across quite as well as perhaps it
could. However I think perhaps it would take a comedy singer-actress of rare
ability to bring the most out of this character. Paul-Ryan
Carberry is entirely satisfactory although the least noticeable of the
three as Dobber the undertaker’s man. Mr and Mrs Old Joe are played by Russell
Dixon and Melanie La Barrie, and here we find a big improvement. The
performers at Chichester did their best, but
they were young and inexperienced and it showed. Russell Dixon
demonstrates a fair understanding of comedy acting. While Melanie La Barrie
turns out the best performance she has given all afternoon. Yes I think overall
this scene and number could work even better, with better actors. However, this
afternoon’s cast did improve the scene from the Chichester
production (and that one had been quite fun).
Who Cares, sung by Sevan Stephan in the mortuary is the
least memorable song in the entire score. It could be due as much to the fact
that all the other songs in the score are so brilliant (and memorable). There
is nothing inherently wrong with it. And indeed Carr’s lyrics are pretty much
up to his usual standards. The music is entirely pleasant, satisfactory. But
somehow not very memorable, maybe the tune sounds almost more like a piece of
underscoring music, than a song. There is nothing wrong in this, if that is
what was intended. Maybe it’s meant to be forgettable, as if to illustrate the
point, who cares about Scrooge, who would remember a person like that, who can
tell.
Paul-Ryan Carberry
and Vicki Lee Taylor actually succeed in making the two debtors into
noticeable characters, though their roles are small.
At the Crachits all the
children, including the boys are busy sewing, in this production rather than
clothing they seem to be working on some kind of embroidery drape. I’m not
quite sure what this is supposed to represent. However, I did notice one young
male actor looked like he was getting very into whatever he was sewing. That is
good to see.
The Graveyard finds one of
the actors, I think it might have been Paul-Ryan
Carberry, unless it was Vlach
Ashton, being a statue on top of Scrooge’s tomb, until with a bound he
jumped down and ran off. Impressive. It also reminded me a little of the
dancing statues in Mary Poppins.
Until now Peter Polycarpou
had shown himself to be a pretty decent actor, however in this scene I felt he
went too far, playing for laughs with a lack of seriousness. He had Scrooge
apparently laughing on finding he was still alive and had not missed Christmas
Day, the spirits did it all in one night. Of course some people do laugh when
they are nervous (or upset or frightened), so it’s possible he was trying to
convey that. However, even if that was his intention, it could also be
interpreted as hamming up the performance, and I think it would have been
better to play safe and not have been putting laughter in there. There are
occasions when I think skilled performers may getaway with doing something a
little differently to the expected way of doing something, and it can make a
refreshing change, but attempts at being different do have to be done with
care, because there is always a danger that the audience won’t “get it”.
I felt he went too far. However he sang that marvellous song Merry
Christmas Everybody perfectly satisfactorily, well it’s brilliant song.
When it comes to the reprise the entire company put over with the verve and enthusiasm
it deserves. The scene also included one lovely surprise, the boy whom Scrooge
sends to the poulters, enters from the back of the auditorium, coming right
down an aisle, it’s soon apparent he isn’t just any boy, but a chimney sweep,
carrying his brush over his shoulder. For those of us who’ve seen it, it was
such a striking reminder of another great Jason
Carr musical (which this score is on a par with), and
strangely another adaptation of a Victorian novel, The Waterbabies.
Initially I thought this “boy” must’ve been played by one of the
children in the company, but a close inspection of the programme suggests it
was played by Colin Ryan.
Meanwhile Carl Au
acting with convincing surprise as Fred, on finding his Uncle come to join him
for dinner. I also noticed a few lines had been switched around, with Russell
Dixon’s Great Aunt Emmeline asking for a kitten, rather than young
Frederika, I preferred Chichester’s take on
that. Finally Peter Polycarpou and Hadley Fraser mange a convincing
job of the final moments of the scene between Scrooge and Bob Crachit, and then
the entire company takes their bows and sings a rousing finale of Merry
Christmas Everybody, and possibly a bit of The Christmas Goose.
Somewhere in the show, I think it was the finale there was fair amount of
dancing, by that very able choreographer Nick Winston and two men in
particular stand out as performing brilliantly, I’m fairly sure they were Carl
Au and Colin Ryan (which is to be expected given where those two
trained). Finally the orchestra plays us
out with my favourite song of all The Grand Fezziwig Annual Company
Christmas Ball. I think it’s a shame that song didn’t get a proper
reprise.
It was great to hear Jason Carr’s score so wonderfully well played
by the band (Curtis Stansfield, Chris Burn, Lewis Rowlands,
Sarah James, Mark Taylor and
Musical Director Tom Deering. The designs by Colin Richmond
were, I felt an improvement on Chichester. The
use of puppets was an interesting idea, and quite a challenge for the actors,
bearing in mind that judging by their resumes they generally seem to have very
little, if any, experience of puppeteering prior to this show (of course
puppeteers who are also actors are sometimes known to hide their puppeteering
credits). Therefore the five performers taking up puppets, must’ve had to rely
a good deal on effective coaching from Rachael Canning. Vicki Lee
Taylor seemed to take the best to working the rod puppets on this show.
Though Paul-Ryan Carberry
and Colin Ryan did reasonably well. One might note that Colin trained at
the same institution that some thirty five years earlier trained a certain
notable puppeteer (though not in puppetry). Vlach Ashton seemed to work
better using larger puppets, that relied more on the way he moved his whole
body, than the smaller ones dependent on channelling a performance into the
hands. It is the first time I have ever seen puppets used in a Jason Carr musical. Though I have read
that two shows at Chichester did include
notable puppeteers among their casts. For example Born Again’s Rhino
Movement Coach was William Todd Jones (who was also in the
ensemble), and probably relied to some extent on his puppetry skills for being
a rhino in that show. While Jason Carr’s
numerous credits as a pianist accompanist, do happen to include playing the
piano “The English Muppet”, a fact strangely absent from Jason’s resume.
Anyway, these days when what with The Lion King, Avenue Q,
and War Horse around, there does seem to be a bit of a fashion
for incorporating puppets into musicals. Certainly I can see the value of using
puppets for ghosts. I’m just not altogether sure about using them instead of
children. That said Fan and Boy Scrooge were very sweetly performed, especially
Fan.
One
of the difficulties with Jason Carr’s
music, is that ideally you need the sort of performers are accomplished at
singing quite complex music theatre, very similar to the sort of skills needed
to performer Berstein or Sondheim. Musically this cast was a bit
of a mixture. Their acting abilities were also somewhat mixed. Dale Meeks’s
most noticeable part is The Ghost Of Christmas Present. The rest of the time he
is a useful member of the ensemble, but rarely noticeable. Vlach Ashton
is pretty much never really noticed for singing, or much for acting. He is
however noticeable for his movement abilities. I think he was the ghost who was
forever crawling around here and there, including perched on Scrooge’s bed. Sophie
Bould was the least noticeable of the women. However, she did play
Scrooge’s sweetheart Belle, and interestingly managed to make Penney into a
noticeable bit character. Her Marilyn was less noticeable. Another actor who
did a lot of minor parts, and yet by contrast to the others made a lot of them
was Colin Ryan. All the more surprising given that he is making his
professional stage debut, but then he was trained at Arts Ed, and seem
to have a habit of turning out performers with a lot of presence. He certainly
seems very ‘at home’ in this musical in Birmingham.
Most of his parts emphasise his youthful qualities. It’s noticeable that many
of the best performances come from the younger actors in the company, perhaps
partly because so many of them are talented performers starting out who haven’t
yet made their names that much. Of course older actors can bring experience to
their parts, but some of this material would be quite challenging for musical
theatre actors in London’s West
End, let alone a regional rep such as this. Certainly in his
resume Sevan Stephen actually states that his most challenging role to
date is playing Mr Fezziwig in this production, and I could see from his
performance that it clearly is a challenge for him, trying to sing and dance
this. His diction on the singing was particularly poor as was Melaine La
Barrie’s, which was a shame, as this somewhat spoilt one of the best songs
in the show, The Grand Fezziwig Annual Company Christmas Ball.
Mind you even first West End performers do not
always have brilliant diction. Melaine La Barrie gave her best performance
as Mrs Old Joe, since she actually managed to act this character fairly well,
giving us a sense of the comedy in the script.
Likewise Russell Dixon played Mr Old Joe pretty well. His big
part however was Marley where given that he clearly can sing, I felt he didn’t
quite do the song justice. He was satisfactory as Great Aunt Emmeline, although
I didn’t really like the character being played by a man. Probably the biggest
named actor in the cast is Leading Man Peter Polycarpou. Obviously a
show like this needs to have a reasonably big named actor in the title role. He
is one of those actors who can sing, but seems to be not primarily a singer.
Fortunately he managed to handle his songs sensible. Generally he commanded the
stage pretty well as an actor. Although I felt he overdid it somewhat on the
opening of the final scene. Overall I felt that while it was good to see the
part played by an actor of the right age bracket, the young men at Chichester actually played the character better. However,
let’s hope this show continues to be revived, then maybe we could have an even
better actor for this key role. Still for a production in a small rep theatre,
this was a generally good leading performance. Perhaps the best known of the
younger performers is Vicki Lee Taylor. She is a very engaging actress,
with a fair amount of stage presence and charisma, plus she already has
considerable and varied experience. She shone the most performing Fan. however
her acting roles included Ash, a quite noticeable and engaging ghost. She also
played Mrs Dilber fairly well, better than it was played at Chichester,
though I still think there is room for improvement if possible, and then a
debtor’s wife. Of the less known actors, Paul-Ryan
Carberry proves to be quite a find. He his good stage presence, can act,
and he can sing decently. Basically most of the skills that are really needed
in a musical like this. He was at his best as Silver, who seemed to be a leader
among the ghosts. Topper brought his singing talents to the fore with Yes
And No (though he had a hard job keeping up with Carl Au), whole
his other bit parts Dobber and the Debter were both played satisfactorily, as
was Scrooge as a young man. Playing Nephew Fred, Carl Au is the latest
in a long line of accomplished singer-actors a Stephen Sondheim’s work,
to have turned their brilliant talents to singing Jason
Carr’s brilliant work, some of the others include: Michael Ball, William Dazley, Anna
Francolini, Teddy Kempner, Beverley Klein, Anna Lowe, Brendan
O’Hea, Mandy Patinkin, Liza Pulman, Philip Quast, and
not forgetting Arts Ed trained Louise Gold and Maria Friedman.
Now Carl Au upholds this tradition, and performs Jason’s songs every bit
as well as one might expect from a performer of his clearly high calibre.
Another extremely musically adept singer, whose performance really stood out,
is that of Hadley Fraser as Bob Crachit. Hadley in fact trained at The
Royal College Of Music, though he seems quite at home performing in
the university city of Birmingham. Singing may be what he does best,
but he also acted the part jolly well too. He was quite a trove for this
production. One more amazing performance was Rosalie Craig as Lydia
Bob’s wife, she had a lot of stage presence; sang and acted brilliantly, and
made the role of Mrs Crachit something, and also Mrs Dabchick as only a good
comedy actress could do it.
However,
above all, the real joy of this production is simply the fact that this show,
originally commissioned by The Chichester Youth Theatre, has now been given
a professional revival, at Birmingham Rep. This revival proves just how
durable the piece is. One that does just as well, if not better, performed by a
different cast to that for which it was written. The script by Bryony Lavery
is good, and the songs by Jason Carr
are just fantastic, real quality. It’s a shame, being a Londoner, I have to
travel to places like Birmingham
to see and hear musical theatre of this quality. Travelling during the
Christmas period, when so many people are travelling means very crowded trains,
and a lot of waiting around to catch them. I found myself wandering round a shopping mall or two, while waiting for trains, this entailed
hearing a lot of mediocre Christmas music, which sounded even worse, after
having had such an enjoyable time in the theatre listening to the super high
quality of Jason Carr’s
glorious songs. Anyway it’s just terrific to see a piece like this given a
revival. Let’s hope it paves the way for further revivals, bringing Jason Carr’s wonderful musicals to come to
the wider audience they so richly deserve.
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
Off Site Links:
Birmingham Rep’s Official Website: http://www.birmingham-rep.co.uk/
Composer Jason Carr’s
Official Website: http://www.jasoncarr.org.uk/
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
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