Sublime SUNDAY....

On Saturday O and I went to see Stephen Sondheim's SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE at the small Menier Chocolate Factory fringe theatre in Southwark. This most personal of his musicals - dealing with the sacrifices an artist must make to pursue his vision - is a tricky one to pull off. It's hard to engage with the characters of Georges Seurat in the first act and his great-grandson also named George in the second while at the same time the score includes some of the loveliest music Sondheim has written. I remember being disappointed with the 1990 National Theatre's production possibly because I was so familiar with the Broadway recording with the powerhouse performances of Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters. However this production by Sam Buntrock is an utter triumph again proving that the smaller you can do a Sondheim musical the more resonant the piece will be (mind you this isn't always the case, I disliked the cast-playing-instruments SWEENEY TODD earlier this year).

Daniel Evans, who seems to be getting better as he gets older, plays the two Georges very well while Anna Jane Casey is fine as Dot although her singing could do with a bit more heft. There is excellent support namely from Jan Soper as Seurat's mother, Simon Green as Jules, Seurat's more successful artist colleague and Liza Sadovy as Yvonne his wife and secret admirer of Georges. One of my favourite scenes is a small one between Yvonne and Dot in George's studio which is played very well by the two actresses. 

However what makes this production a winner is the excellent design team of David Farley's set and Timothy Bird's digital projection which floods the stage with colour and fluid movement. Used with economy and wit the digital animations are a total delight with nice telling touches such as the actor's one by one leaving the second act tableau of Seurat's "Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" as their characters digitally appear in the painting on the museum wall behind them.

I can never deceide which is my favourite Sondheim show - usually it's the one I have just come out of - but SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE lays claim to the one that effects me emotionally. The three songs that end the first act floor me: Dot's WE DO NOT BELONG TOGETHER usually starts me off, Georges and his mother's BEAUTIFUL keeps me sniffing on a low-light and then... the tears just flow during the song SUNDAY. 

One of the most beautiful melodies ever, it's sung softly by the characters in the Seurat's painting as he arranges them into the final tableau that will freeze into "Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte". It gets me every time... I'm not talking "tear tricking down face" I'm talking shuddering sobs. I cannot explain it.. it just reduces me to an emotional blub at the end of each act.

I loved this production.