Theatre review: She Loves Me

I started 2016 with a musical about a rather niche subject; I end the year on a more old-fashioned one that isn't strictly speaking formulaic - it became the formula for several Hollywood Rom-Coms. She Loves Me has a book by Joe Masteroff, music by Jerry Bock and lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and takes its story from Hungarian play Parfumerie, about hate turning to love in the titular shop. Georg (Mark Umbers) is the perennially single deputy store manager who's resorted to a lonely hearts column, and has fallen for a woman he's been exchanging letters with. When one of the shop clerks leaves, her replacement Amalia (Scarlett Strallen) instantly annoys him by selling a music box he'd bet would be unsellable, and their relationship is fractious from then on. Needless to say, Amalia is actually the "Dear Friend" he's been writing to, and she feels the same way about his letters.

Theatre review: The Threepenny Opera

Prepare for shares in eyeliner to soar as Rufus Norris brings Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's satirical musical The Threepenny Opera to the Olivier with a new translation of the book and lyrics by Simon Stephens, and Rory Kinnear at the head of a real luxury cast. Mack the Knife (Kinnear) is a violent East End criminal, who's managed to avoid punishment so far through a combination of Chief Inspector Tiger Brown (Peter De Jersey) being an old army buddy of his, and the fact that Mack has an incriminating dossier that could cause the new King of England some embarrassment. But his downfall might well come not from his crimes but from his marriage: His new wife is the seemingly timid accountant Polly (Rosalie Craig,) who he hopes can use her organisational skills to help build his criminal empire up.

Theatre review: Sunny Afternoon

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: Not sure when the papers are being invited to this.

Hampstead Theatre have scored a number of West End transfers recently, and they're starting to look like that's their main aim as a producing house. It certainly seems that way as they enter the overcrowded field of the jukebox musical with Sunny Afternoon, a trip through the early years of The Kinks. Rather than fit Ray Davies' songs to an unrelated story, Joe Penhall's book recreates the band's origin and early triumphs and disasters (Davies also receives a story credit, which presumably translates into "remembering stuff.") Starting as the backing band to cheesy crooner Wace (Big Favourite Round These Parts Dominic Tighe,) Ray (John Dagleish,) his brother Pete (George Maguire) and their friend Pete (Ned Derrington¹) on bass soon find that their working class earthiness is a better fit to the emerging music scene of the '60s. Adding drummer Mick (Adam Sopp) they become The Kinks, a name none of them can quite figure out the origins of.

Theatre review: Charley's *unt

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: This review is of the final reduced-price preview. All remaining performances are being sold at full price, and the critics aren't being invited in for another week.

I'd heard of Brandon Thomas' famous comedy Charley's *unt, but all I knew was the title, the fact that cross-dressing figured somewhere, and its best-known quote "Brazil... where the nuts come from" (which, as famous highlights go, isn't entirely encouraging about the rest.) When it was announced that the Menier Chocolate Factory would be reviving it, the reaction online didn't bode well either, with surprise at the choice, and the phrase "horribly dated" being used quite liberally. On the other hand, Big Favourite Round These Parts Dominic Tighe is in the cast, so what can you do? Turn up at the Menier, where Jack (Tighe) and his friend Charley (Benjamin Askew) are trying to find a way to propose to their girlfriends. Charley's *unt Donna Lucia, whom he's never met before, is due to return from Brazil, and seems like a suitable chaperone. When she fails to turn up and Jack finds himself at risk of having to go work abroad before finding a moment alone with Kitty (Leah Whitaker,) their friend Lord Fancourt Babberley (Matthew Horne) is called upon to throw a dress on and impersonate Donna Lucia.

Theatre review: The Art of Concealment

Last year, Terence Rattigan's centenary brought some high-profile revivals and a reappraisal of the playwright's work. This year we get The Art of Concealment, a look at the man himself. Though I've enjoyed Rattigan's plays, it was more the prospect of Dominic Tighe as the younger Terry who attracted me to the show, than the biographical aspect. And writer Giles Cole falls into a couple of major traps associated with biographical plays, most obviously in trying to tell the whole life story in a couple of hours, rather than concentrating on a couple of key incidents or relationships. So we join Rattigan at Harrow before jumping to his dropping out of Oxford and his career taking off just before the War. After the interval we have his drop in popularity after the attacks by the Kitchen Sink playwrights of the 1960s. In a rather old-fashioned narrative, the story is told though the reminiscences of the older Rattigan (Alistair Findlay,) who occasionally limps onto the stage to take us to the next chapter, and swaps places with Tighe once we get to the playwright's latter years.

Tighe is suitably sexy and charming as the young Terry but in trying to get the facts crammed in he's given a clunky, exposition-heavy script to try and bring to life. Most of the supporting cast is solid if unspectacular (though Christopher Morgan's over-gesticulating Cuthbert got old fast) but some of the dialogue just crashes to the ground - at one point we actually have it pointed out that Rattigan's musings on one of his characters are in fact a reflection on himself. (In what I think is another classic mistake, we see Rattigan and his then-lover Kenneth (Daniel Bayle) act out a scene from The Browning Version, which is only ever going to make the play's own dialogue pale in comparison.)

Rattigan went to great pains to conceal his sexuality from the public, and though this forms a major part of this story it's also treated with a similar coyness: It's just as well Tighe looks good in costumes that include a tux and an RAF uniform, as you won't see him out of them. Charlie Hollway as his younger American lover is the only one who manages to briefly bring some sexuality into Knight Mantell's clinical production. (Though I would have found Hollway sexier if his hairdo for this show didn't appear to be modelled on my mum's.) Similarly, when the playwright is confronted by Aunt Edna (Judy Buxton,) an imaginary representation of his dwindling fanbase, she concludes he brought on his own downfall by continuing to party in the post-war austerity years. But these constant parties were only ever alluded to, the only social life we've actually seen has mainly involved his small coterie of already-bitter queens. Ultimately the title is a bit too apt, The Art of Concealment doesn't reveal much about its subject.

The Art of Concealment by Giles Cole is booking until the 28th of January at Jermyn Street Theatre (returns only.)

Running time: 2 hours 20 minutes including interval.