MAGGIE MAY at the Finborough - Wake Up Maggie... you're onstage again.

Four years after the life-changing success of OLIVER! - which was still running in the West End - Lionel Bart's new musical MAGGIE MAY opened at the Adelphi Theatre in 1964.  Despite winning the Novello award for Best Theatre Score and a Critics Circle award for Best Musical, the show simply vanished from the repertoire.  Our Liverpudlian heroine appeared briefly in 1992 in a National Youth Theatre production but the revival at the Finborough Theatre is it's first professional appearance in 55 years.

Bart was still riding the success of OLIVER! when MAGGIE MAY became his second consecutive show to open at the Adelphi.  His 1962 musical BLITZ! - whoever said exclamation marks were a recent way to denote a musical - had opened there for a moderately successful run but was judged to be an uneven show; Sean Kenny's collapsing East End London set garnering the most attention over Bart's score or performances.  Returning again to the working-class milieu that had proved so successful for him, Bart turned away from London and focused on the thriving Liverpool scene, collaborating with writer Alun Owen who had success with his Liverpool plays PROGRESS TO THE PARK and NO TRAMS TO LIME STREET, and had just won acclaim for his script for A HARD DAY'S NIGHT.

Bart's favourite designer Sean Kenny recreated the Liverpool docks setting, while Owen was reunited with Canadian director Ted Kotcheff who had directed his plays on stage and television.  The show reunited Bart with Barry Humphries who had appeared in London and New York as OLIVER''s Mr Sowerberry - here playing the Brechtian role The Balladeer - and the show starred Rachel Roberts as Maggie May and Kenneth Haigh as Patrick Casey.  The cast also included such future tv names as Morecombe and Wise 'star' Janet Webb, Geoffrey Hughes, Billy Boyle (currently appearing as Theodore Whitman in the National Theatre's FOLLIES) and in the chorus, making her West End debut, Julia McKenzie.  MAGGIE MAY not only had a cast recording but Bart's friend Judy Garland also released four of it's songs on an EP.  In an odd twist, Bart had originally offered OLIVER! to Rachel Roberts but she declined so Georgia Brown got the role; he then offered MAGGIE MAY to Georgia but she declined so Rachel Roberts got it!  Non-singer Roberts' vocal chords just about survived to the end of her contract where she was replaced by - you guessed - Georgia Brown.

MAGGIE  MAY was Bart's last hurrah however: his 1965 musical TWANG!! was a theatrical car-crash and his 1969 Broadway musical LA STRADA not only had most of his score ditched but closed after a single night.  To finance these disasters, Bart had stupidly sold the rights to his hit shows - Max Bygraves paid £350 for OLIVER! and then re-sold them for £250,000 - so by 1972, Lionel Bart, the once and future king of British musicals, was bankrupt and suffering from alcoholism and substance abuse.  He re-awakened public interest with his Abbey National jingle 'Happy Endings' in the late 1980s, and in 1994 - the same year that MAGGIE MAY's Alun Owen died - Cameron Mackintosh revived OLIVER! with Bart making additions to the score for which he received a share of the profits.  He died in 1999 of liver cancer.

OLIVER! has had many revivals since it's 1960 opening - largely thanks to the enduring popularity of the 1968 film adaptation - but his other shows have been overshadowed.  Interestingly, his two 'contemporary' scores - FINGS AIN'T WOT THEY USED T'BE and MAGGIE MAY - are certainly influenced by his parallel career as a pop songwriter so maybe sound dated to theatre producers today; but they also carry within them an earthy, vital spark that didn't see it's like again until Willy Russell's BLOOD BROTHERS.

Maggie is a vivacious tart with a heart whose inner sadness, at losing her childhood sweetheart Patrick Casey to the life of a sailor, results in calling all her punters 'Casey'.  She lives and works near the Liverpool docks with her salty friend Maureen, and one day word reaches Maggie that Patrick Casey has arrived back, having left the navy for good.  They meet again and immediately realize they were meant to be together.  Patrick's friend Judder gets him a job on the docks but for Patrick this is a poisoned chalice; his father Joe was a famous trade unionist and rabble-rouser, loved by the workers and hated by the bosses.  His death at a demonstration has made him a legend and Patrick finds this a burden to carry with his fellow-workers who expect so much of him.

However when a worker is killed by a falling crate Patrick shows he is his father's son; not so much for the death but for the fact that the crate contained a secret shipment of guns, bound for South America which Patrick knows will be used against striking workers.  This leads him to confront his father's former crony Willie Morgan who is now the corrupt head of the docker's union.  Morgan knew the guns were being shipped as it meant jobs for his men but Patrick accuses him of class treachery.  Willie realizes Casey could easily displace him so decides to ruin him... and the key to this is through Maggie.

More guns arrive dockside and Casey's gang are assigned the job; Casey refuses and is sacked but Judder whips up the fellow dockers to walk out in support of their new hero Patrick, only Maggie realizing that this can only lead to more trouble.  She warns Patrick about going up against Morgan but he persists on addressing a large strike meeting about the need to be united with other world-wide comrades.  Morgan speaks next and manages to turn the strikers' against any further action - why think of others when your own job is on the line?  Morgan makes a move on Maggie knowing she is unhappy with Patrick but despite a trip to the fair, she rebuffs Morgan knowing that Patrick is her real love.

Patrick realizes his activism is doomed by his fellow-workers attitudes and decides his only happiness is with Maggie who has told him she will give up the game for him.  Patrick leaves her and bumps into Judder who is angry that his friend has given up so easy, especially for a tart.  They fight over Maggie, but Patrick says he has one last action to complete for the workers of the world.  Jealous of Maggie and of Patrick's secret mission, he informs Morgan that Patrick is headed for the docks.  As Casey attempts to use a crane to dump the crates of guns into the river, the police, Morgan, Judder and Maggie arrive on the dock...

MAGGIE MAY does feel uneven: Alun Owen's blue-collar book addressing trade union corruption and the in-fighting workers is a natural for his "Armchair Theatre" tv plays but sit oddly against Bart's score - both are good but play like a cut-and-shunt job.  However a little doctoring could give both a better flow; what is remarkable is to see a musical so committed to showing the working-class experience - how often does that happen?

There is a problem with the character of Maggie, a vibrant live-wire at the start of the show, she dwindles towards the end of the show to become a mere bystander to Patrick's fate.  The ending feels like a conscious steal from WEST SIDE STORY with it's sudden tragic conclusion but this too demotes Maggie to being an onlooker in what is supposed to be her story.

Matthew Iliffe's production is constrained by the small auditorium - the Finborough seats only 50 at a squeeze - allowing only a few small crates and a movable metal staircase as a set but the possibilities for the show do come through in his focused and fast-moving show, eliciting strong - sometimes too strong - performances from his cast.  James Darch was excellent as Patrick, a natural leading man with a strong voice and easy charm and he was well-partnered by Kara Lily Hayworth as Maggie, my only complaint being that her singing voice, while pretty in the current theatre soprano way, probably didn't give Maggie's songs their best as they were written for a rougher, more belting voice like Georgia Brown's.

A special mention to the hard-edged Maureen of Natalie Williams, the rest of the cast were all ok but Michael Nelson as Judder for some reason shouted rather than speaking his lines which seemed absurd in such a small space, however he was an excellent dancer, easily the one to focus on during the punchy and dynamic dance numbers choreographed by Sam Spencer-Lane to *just* fit the space.

Lionel Bart's score had several of his trademark numbers - the big ballads for his leading lady, a solo for his lead man reviewing his situation, ensemble numbers, a few comedy routine numbers and, kicking off the second act, an early sixties rock 'n' roll number that Cliff Richard wouldn't have turned his quiff up at - a very special mention to Henry Brennan, playing the whole score on a piano.

I honestly thought I would never see a revival of this but I am glad I did: for all it's uneven qualities, it's possibly one of the UK's most over-looked musicals.  Congratulations to Matthew Iliffe and his cast of 13 (where the original cast hit 50!), MAGGIE MAY is now sold-out for it's run at the Finborough.

 

JUST TO GET MARRIED at the Finborough - the eternal struggle...

Looking back in 1924, Virginia Woolf posited the idea that in 1910 "human character changed".  She admitted this was an arbitrary choice but it was a year that seemed to ripple with change beneath the surface.  Among that year's little earthquakes were Dr Crippin being arrested for his wife's murder aboard a ship thanks to a wired telegram, Roger Fry organizing the first Post-Impressionist exhibition in London, and EM Forster publishing HOWARDS END.

For some reason, HOWARDS END kept popping up in my mind while watching JUST TO GET MARRIED which marked my first-ever visit to West London's small but important fringe venue the Finborough Theatre.  The Finborough prides itself on resurrecting 'lost' 20th Century plays that might just still be relevant today.  Their latest find is Cicely Hamilton's play, first performed in 1910 and not seen in London for over a hundred years. More than ever, one is aware of hearing words and thoughts long-silenced primarily by those stalking horses, modernity and fashion.

While Hamilton's play exhibited the drawbacks of the classic three-act upper-class drama which probably did it no favours, especially after the cataclysmic Great War, it still sparked with a debate that rages on, the position of women in a world of money and limited opportunity.

Cicely Hamilton was born in 1872 into a military family in London, the eldest of four children, whose life was rocked at the age of 10 when her mother left the family forever.  Cicely was moved into foster homes which left her wretched.  She took the obvious job of being a teacher but she soon chucked it to become a touring actress but this too left her disenchanted so she turned her hand to writing.

Her first play was produced in 1906 and her second in 1908, DIANA OF DOBSONS, was a big success.  In the same year she joined the Women's Social and Political Union and even wrote the lyrics for their anthem "March of The Women".  But unhappy with Emmaline Pankhurst's elitist stance she left to join a more root-and-branch Suffragette organization as well as help founding two arts-based women's groups.

Her political life reflected in her art, writing three plays in 1909 HOW THE VOTE WAS WON, A PAGEANT OF GREAT WOMEN and MARRIAGE AS A TRADE.  She followed these with JUST TO GET MARRIED.  As with so many women fighting for the right to vote, WWI saw her having to stand down from campaigning and join the war effort.  She became an army nurse but continued her writing career after the war; she died in 1952.

JUST TO GET MARRIED centres on Georgiana Vicary, a 29 year-old upper-class woman who is fast becoming a burden to her aunt and uncle with whom she lives.  Their own son will soon need to be financed through his college years and Lady Catherine, Georgiana's formidable aunt, is fast losing her patience with her niece's unmarried state.  Hamilton's own experience of unhappy foster homes is certainly reflected in her character's shaky position within the family.

What is so frustrating for them all is that Georgiana is being pursued by Adam Lankester who is obviously besotted with her but whose crippling shyness makes it impossible for him to tell her this, let alone propose marriage.  This state of affairs annoys Georgiana too, she cannot do anything to provoke him into a proposal and despite the sympathy of her girl friends, a happily married woman and a bohemian artist, she is all too aware that in the wider society's eyes, time is running out for her.

But Adam finds the stammered words to ask her to marry him and Georgiana of course says yes.  The day of the marriage arrives in a whirl of catering requirements, wedding presents and trousseau fittings, but Georgiana becomes more and more agitated until she can no longer suppress her anguish: that she knows she has only said yes to become a wife - it could have been any man, just anyone to move her along the tracks of her pre-destined life.  She tries to explain to Adam that she would be depriving him of the chance of a wife that loves him but he can only lash out at her for being cruel.

In a series of confrontations Georgiana is faced with the icy fury of Lady Catherine, and the derision of her spoiled cousin Bertha.  After denouncing them and the wider society that forces women to be mere property, trained only in writing thank you letters and putting up their hair, Georgiana flees the Grayle family home and makes for a local station in a thunderous storm.  With just the vague promise of shelter with her artist friend in London, Georgiana faces her life alone... or does she?

Hamilton's play seems to point towards a sour but realistic climax but, after a first-act of seemingly-Shavian drawing-room wit and a second of almost Ibsenite emotional bloodletting, she gives us a surprising happy ending, but on reflection it can be seen as a-wished for way ahead... a place where men and women can start from with openness and understanding.

The intimacy of the Finborough's 50-seat theatre space helped Melissa Dunne's production enormously - we too were guests at the Grayle's country house watching Georgiana's fate unspool and the by-necessity simple design was charming.  I did however think that us the audience would have given the dramatic license needed for the staff to be summoned using a small bell, not the huzzing big school playground bell that sat so incongruously on the bureau.

Philippa Quinn was impressive as Georgiana but her second act Wrestling With Her Guilty Feelings was just as emphatic as that - she overplayed the ironic snorts and bitter expressions of happiness to such an extent that it made you wonder why none of her fellow characters didn't say whatever the Edwardian equivalent is for "Bitch, are you taking the piss?"  However once her Guilty Secret was out and she was allowed to just play the anger in her situation, Quinn was very good.

Jonny McPherson was a delight as Adam, moving seamlessly from gauche twit to being genuinely moving as his character's emotions went from love to despair; hopefully this will lead to bigger chances for him.  Nicola Blackman was a real delight as Lady Catherine, her gushing benevolence being turned off like a tap at the mere hint of her wishes not being carried out.  Her interrogation of the distraught Georgiana was marvellous: a woman of her class being confronted with her own failings but swatting them off like flies from the sandwiches at her last garden party.

I also liked the impenetrable dimness of Simon Rhodes' Uncle Theodore and Joanne Ferguson as Georgiana's sympathetic but position-conscious married friend Mrs Maccartney.  As I said Melissa Dunne directed the play with a sureness of hand and with no air of condescension to Hamilton's Edwardian dialogue or plot.

It was interesting to see that Cicely Hamilton could go from writing three polemical plays about the struggle for women's rights to this which illustrated the same theme but within a dramatic narrative.  Well done to the Finborough for championing this writer and I am sure I will be back to see another of it's reclaiming of past plays.