SPRINGTIME FOR…EVERYONE
Joyful, headlong and full-hearted, here comes sacred outrage. If director Patrick Marber and the Menier had been minded to issue wet ‘trigger warnings’ it would take up so much extra paper we’d be re-triggered by the environmental impact. But what was firmly grasped by the great Mel Brooks (with Thomas Meehan for the musical) is that for all their horror Nazis ARE funny : that preening pomposity ,blind hero worship, ersatz folksiness. Rich thwarted old ladies in leopardprint and endlessly willing Swedish divas are funny too. So is over-camp gay culture and the desperate ambition and bitter disappointments of Broadway show-people . Even accountants are funny. And – loud gasps from the be-kind mafia – so is poor Leo’s anxiety disorder.
It doesn’t mean all these things are not also deserving of all serious and gloomy respect in other plays. It just means that if you don’t sometimes laugh at them and yourself, you’re barely human. So rejoice at the cleansing mirth of this legendary musical, and feel lucky to be drawn into it in this quite intimate space,.
Marber, fresh between runs of directing the brilliant “What we talk about..” at the Marylebone Theatre (scroll below) has assembled a sixteen-strong cast doing the work of sixty, led by Andy Nyman as Bialystock, amiably manic , with Marc Antolin clutching the blue-blanket of reassurance as the sweetest of Leos. And two sacred monsters of absurd excess : Harry Morrison’s Liebkind and Trevor Ashley as Roger de Bris. Joanna Woodward’s Ulla is a rose amid these troublesome thorns, deadpan comic and a hell of a belter: her intermission rearranging of Bialystock’s dingy office (credit to designer Scott Pask) got a laugh of its own. Lorin Latarro’s choreography is witty all the way, tiny jokes making you want to go again in case there are more.
So revel in the klezmer Jewishness of the opening dance around Bialystock, in the treasurable rhymes (faster pace/master race, obscurer/fuehrer) . Feel the sudden moments of real emotional empathy even with Liebkind (“Hitler, there was a painter!” and “Hitler was BUTCH!”). Love his chorus of pigeons with swastikas on their wings. Identify with the crazy progress of Bialystock and Bloom , with Max’s repeated “It’s nothing, I\ll tell you when we’re getting in too deep”, when even Leo sees that they definitely are.
Marber has mused that curiously it’s a story about love, and it is: between the two producers, between Leo and Ulla, De Bris and himself, even Liebkind’s devotion to Hitler and the pigeons. And there’s love pulsing out from a happy audience, too.
The fifth mouse is a special and particular ensemble-mouse. The ten chorus, sometimes assisted by principals (Bialystock turns up as an auditionee!) were nimble , physically witty and perfectly attuned. They cycle through so many costume changes I lost count – as fans, old ladies in leopardprint, auditionees, pigeons, stormtroopers, police, showgirls. Some of the changes are lightning. They’re a joy.
to 1 march rating 5
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