BEAUTIFUL: The Carole King Musical

Well it took a while - and one crushing experience - but I have finally seen BEAUTIFUL, the musical based on the life and work of one of my favourite singers Carole King.

Of course I enjoyed it - with her wonderful catalogue of songs who wouldn't - but maybe a too-thorough knowledge of her story made it seem particularly thin at times.

We had tickets for the show two days before but arriving at the Aldwych with ten minutes to spare before the 7:30pm start time, we were greeted with the news that they had brought the opening night forward so the show had started at 7pm - and didn't we get their e-mail sent at 4:15 that afternoon?  I was shooting basilisk stares at all and sundry especially when their initial recompense was drinks vouchers rather than replacement seats.  As we trudged off I thought aloud that maybe the opening night had been brought forward so Carole King could attend.  Of course I was wrong.

It was actually Carole and fellow legendary songwriters Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil who attended and who joined the cast at the curtain call.  So, you know, nothing to be angry about.

Carole King was raised in post-war Brooklyn, her contemporaries including Neil Sedaka whom she dated in school inspiring his hit OH CAROL, Paul Simon whom she recorded demos with, as well as Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand.  While in college Carole began writing songs with Gerry Goffin, their relationship lead to Carole expecting a baby so they married in 1959, Carole was 17 and Gerry was 20.  Soon they were both working during the day and writing songs in the evening for Don Kirshner at Aldon Music's offices at 1650 Broadway.

Like the nearby Brill Building, 1650 Broadway was a hive of musical activity with songwriters assigned their own rooms where they could write hits for the artists of the day.  Next to Carole and Gerry's room were the team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil and a deep friendship grew along with a competitive spirit: each trying for bigger chart successes and pop music innovation.

More comfortable behind the scenes than performing, Carole also liked being a New Jersey housewife but Gerry chafed at domesticity.  Still only 23, he felt tied-down and several affairs culminated in Earl-Jean McCrea of The Cookies having their child.  The astonishing thing is that he would admit these relationships to Carole who accepted his infidelities not to break up their partnership.  However his drug use and resultant mental health issues eventually led to divorce.  Carole moved to Los Angeles and slowly gained the courage to finally step into the spotlight, resulting in her second album TAPESTRY becoming one of the best-selling albums of all-time.

Douglas McGrath's book has to cover all this and he delivers quite a few laughs along the way - usually from the Mann and Weil characters - and it certainly has a good pace but in the process it reduces Carole and Gerry's personal life to the thinnest of soap opera situations.  Carole's triumphant 1971 Carnegie Hall concert is the climax of the show but is also serves for McGrath to give us the cliche of Gerry making an unannounced visit to her dressing room before she goes on... hey if it's good enough for FUNNY GIRL, MEMPHIS etc.  I did wonder how constrained he was as to what he could include?

Marc Bruni has directed a slick, sparkling and colourful production that does nothing to stand in the way of the Goffin/King and Weil/Mann classics that keep coming one after another, some used as songs within the storyline and others as stand-alone numbers celebrating The Drifters (ON BROADWAY), The Shirelles (WILL YOU STILL LOVE ME TOMORROW), Little Eva (THE LOCO-MOTION) and The Righteous Brothers (YOU'VE LOST THAT LOVIN' FEELING).

The performances are good from a largely-unknown cast: Katie Brayben has a sweet quality as Carole although McGrath gives her little to do but blub for most of the second act and although a good singer she doesn't have that quality of huskiness that makes Carole King's voice so beguiling.  Needless to say the audience snapped to it's feet at her curtain call in a response worthy of Pavlov.  Alan Morrissey does all he can with Gerry but again McGrath gives him little to actually get his teeth into.

Lorna Want and Ian McIntosh have better opportunities to shine as Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann while Glynis Barber has a few nice moments as Carole's mother.  The supporting cast give it their all with a special shout-out to Ed Currie for his excellent recreation of The Righteous Brother's Bill Medley.

If I sound overly critical it's because I so wanted to enjoy the show - and I did - but maybe, as I said before, knowing too much about the subject can be a bad thing.

Maybe a second visit is required to relax and just enjoy the show?

Heaven? You're in Heaven??

Are you still resting your reading eyes from my last extra-long blog?  Apologies Constant Reader, but when I get on a roll...  I can assure you this one will not be as long as I won't have to deal with such a production as the Menier's THE COLOR PURPLE.

Earlier this year the screen-to-stage musical TOP HAT won three Olivier Awards, which I must admit surprised me so I tied up my tap shoes and clacked off to the Aldwych Theatre.

 

One of the incidental pleasures in going was a rare visit to the Aldwych, one of London's most historically important theatres that has become a dumping ground for long-running screen-to-stage musicals like FAME and DIRTY DANCING, productions I would not be caught dead at.  This makes it an obvious fit for TOP HAT but how the ghosts of the Aldwych farceurs and the spectres from it 's time as the original London home of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre must sit in the gods with faces like slapped arses.

 

Perhaps the most famous of the Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers films, TOP HAT (1935) has retained it's frothy, deliciously frivolous charm down the years.  The best Astaire & Rogers films conform to the template of boy meets girl, boy and girl tap dance, boy loses girl, boy and girl do a romantic dance, boy gets girl.  While Fred & Ginger break up to make up, they are usually helped and hindered by a comic supporting cast.  TOP HAT reunites the stars with their pals from THE GAY DIVORCEE (which I prefer to TOP HAT): Edward Everett Horton, Eric Blore and Erik Rhodes with the addition of Helen Broderick.

 

 

The scripts might now raise more smiles than laughs but their marvellous performances divert you from this.  Sadly this was not the case on stage.

 

Musical star Jerry has come to London to appear in producer Horace's show but his loud hoofing in Horace's hotel room annoys the neighbour Dale. When she complains Jerry falls hopelessly in love while Dale assumes he is Horace as she has been told who's room it is.  When she goes to Venice to model clothes for Italian designer Alberto Beddini, Jerry and Horace follow and who should be there too but Madge, Dale's best friend - and Horace's wife.  Of course you cry, Madge is her best friend but has never seen even a picture of her husband!  Jerry pursues Dale, Dale thinks he is Horace so makes a play for Beddini - endless romantic complications ensue.

 

 

As I said this plot can be sustained on film with practiced comedy performers all kept afloat on the gossamer choreography of Astaire and Hermes Pan.  Here, director Matthew White and Howard Jacques' script manages to sustain the action during the first act but by the second act with the switch to Italy fatigue sets in and I found myself caring less and less about the convolutions of the plot as so much of it rested on the supporting cast.

 

Olivier award winner Jon Morrell's costumes were colourful, Hildegarde Bechtler's set was efficient but boiled down to two flats and a middle revolve and Olivier Award winner Bill Deamer's choreography was smart and inventive but seemed to be aware of itself a little too much. To be honest, it seemed at it's best when delivered by the male members of the cast.

 

 

The show came into being as a vehicle for STRICTLY COME DANCING winner Tom Chambers but he had just been replaced by Gavin Lee.  Guess what?  Gavin Lee wasn't on so we had his understudy Alan Burkitt as Jerry who gave a perfectly fine performance but one totally devoid of star quality which is essential for the role.  We all know who has played the role before so you need to Bring It.

 

The other male performance of any note was from Alex Gaumond as the vain Italian designer Beddini who gave a spark of style to his role but he always seemed to have the air of looking faintly embarrassed - no need to be Alex, you were also one of the few saving graces in LEGALLY BLONDE a few years ago.

 

 

Dale was played by American import Kristen Beth Williams who seemed weighed down (probably by the extra name) in the quicksilver role of Dale Tremont.  There was also a certain tart quality to her performance which always seemed to jar with the overall whipped cream atmosphere.  She did however dance very well.

 

I have commented before about recent productions I have seen which seem to be cast with under-whelming supporting performers.  To be brutally honest, the level of performances in TOP HAT was like a bad am/dram company on a rainy Wednesday in Rhyl.  Yes, you Vivien Parry as Madge: a performance of quite rare banality especially when set against the flimsy performance of Clive Hayward as Horace.  I am sure it was a comic masterpiece in his dressing-room mirror.

 

 

TOP HAT also won the Olivier for Best Musical, it's opposition was the other screen-to-stage musical THE BODYGUARD, a yoof musical called LOSERVILLE and a glorified Tina Turner tribute show SOUL SISTER.  Against that line-up I too would have given it to TOP HAT, but quietly and probably wrapped in an old Tesco bag turned inside out.