Theatre review: Grey Gardens

One of my last shows of 2015 was The Dazzle, a story based on a real-life pair of wealthy, reclusive hoarders, and I kick off 2016 with another one, this time in musical form. Edith Bouvier Beale was the aunt of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, who in the 1970s found notoriety when she and her daughter were found living in a dilapidated mansion filled with junk and cats. Named after the house where the two holed themselves up for decades, Doug Wright (book,) Scott Frankel (music) and Michael Korie's (lyrics) Grey Gardens looks at how a family of Hamptons socialites turned into crazy cat ladies, by taking us back to 1941: Edith (Jenna Russell) is organising an engagement party for her daughter Little Edie (Rachel Anne Rayham,) and putting herself at the centre of it with a plan to perform a number of songs. Little Edie has landed a Kennedy of her own, JFK's older brother Joseph Jr* (Aaron Sidwell,) but when her mother realises she'll end up alone, she sabotages the engagement.

Theatre review: A Third

With the Finborough Theatre turned into an upper-middle class living room for Alpha Beta, they couldn't venture too far from that for their alternate show. Hence A Third, Laura Jacqmin's look at modern marriage and how the reality of polyamorous relationships stacks up against the fantasy. After six years of marriage Paul (Jeremy Legat) and Allison (Asha Reid) are still in love and still attracted to each other, but want to pre-empt the seven-year itch and think threesomes - with very strict rules - are the answer. They find Jay (Will Alexander,) who's been "a third" many times before on Craigslist, and have a successful evening with him; next they go to a lesbian club night, where they convince Mariella (Lucy Roslyn) to join them. Not sure if they want to continue with the open relationship, the couple stop contacting both of them.

Theatre review: Thérèse Raquin

For the second time this year the Finborough Theatre premieres a new musical, and once again it's one taking on an unlikely dark subject: Émile Zola's Thérèse Raquin is adapted for the stage with music by Craig Adams, and book and lyrics by Nona Shepphard (also directing,) and the big draw for me is that Julie Atherton plays the title character. Orphaned at a young age, Thérèse is adopted by her aunt Madame Raquin (Tara Hugo,) and when she grows up is persuaded to marry her sickly cousin Camille (Jeremy Legat.) What her aunt intends as a kindness, enfolding Thérèse into her family, actually ends up stifling her, and this only gets worse when they move to Paris, and a flat above a back alley shop. When Camille's childhood friend Laurent (Ben Lewis) turns up and is also embraced into the family, Thérèse sees an alternative.

Theatre review: Curtains

Kander and Ebb's Curtains is a fairly obscure musical by the standards of the songwriters of Cabaret and Chicago (they obviously liked one-word titles that start with "C.") It got a Broadway run in 2007 but no West End transfer, so Robert McWhir's production at the Landor, the pub theatre with a particular focus on musicals, is its UK professional premiere. A play-within-a-play, it follows the Boston run of "Robbin' Hood," a musical with hopes of making it to Broadway, but troubled not only by the unfinished songs but also by the terrible performance of the lead actress, a Hollywood starlet unable to hit her notes or remember her lines. When she suddenly drops dead at the curtain call, one problem at least is solved; but the policeman investigating insists on keeping the cast locked in the theatre until the murder is solved - and until the troublesome big number can be rewritten.