Theatre review: Barnum

One thing you can usually expect from the Menier Chocolate Factory is a pretty safe palate and a commercial sensibility, so it’s a surprise to see them spaff a big budget and their Christmas show on a gamble, and one that doesn’t pay off at that. Maybe it’s a reflection of Cy Coleman (music,) Michael Stewart (lyrics) and Mark Bramble’s (book) hero and his tendency to lay the big decisions in his life on the toss of a coin that’s led Gordon Greenberg’s production to cast Marcus Brigstocke in a part he has no obvious qualification for, the titular role in Barnum. The 19th century impresario P.T. Barnum was given the name (most likely by himself) The Greatest Showman, and the musical follows his earlier forays into show business (his co-founding of Barnum & Bailey’s Circus is pretty much the show’s epilogue) and his relationship with his wife Charity (Laura Pitt-Pulford,) who provides the nous behind his flair for spectacle.

Theatre review: 42nd Street

The pull-quote on the poster promises one of the most famous openings in musical theatre - no, not Elaine Paige's vagina, but the seemingly infinite rows of tap-dancing chorus girls and boys who fill the stage as the curtain goes up on 42nd Street. Harry Warren (music,) Al Dubin (lyrics,) Michael Stewart & Mark Bramble's (book - Bramble also directs) musical is based on a novel, presumably a pretty short one as this classic story of overnight stardom is the Broadway success fantasy at its simplest. Peggy (Clare Halse) is fresh off the bus in New York when she flukes her way into the chorus of a new Broadway show. During the out-of-town tryouts though, leading lady Dorothy (Sheena Easton) breaks her leg, and the only wait, Sheena Easton? I haven't heard that name in decades. OK, fair enough, Sheena Easton it is. The only way for the show to go on is to cancel all the previews, bring the Broadway opening forward, rehearse Peggy in the lead in 36 hours straight and open to the critics immediately.

Theatre review: The Grand Tour

Unusually for the Finborough, their first show of 2015 is running for two months rather than just one - like one of its characters, they must be optimistic about the chances of The Grand Tour, a 1979 Jerry Herman musical that has never before been staged in Europe, finding a large audience. Set in France in 1940, it follows Polish Jew Jacobowsky (Alastair Brookshaw,) who's been fleeing persecution all his life, and now buys a car to make his latest escape - except he can't drive. Antisemitic Polish Colonel Tadeusz Stjerbinsky (Nic Kyle) has a list of names he needs to deliver to London to help the resistance against the Nazis back in Poland. He can drive, but has no means of transport, so with only the country of their birth in common the two team up for a journey to freedom - stopping along the way to pick up Marianne (Zoë Doano,) the French woman the Colonel loves.