Theatre review: Aspects of Love

Although I’m not much of a fan of Dr Baron Dame Sir Andrew Lloyd Lord Webber BA (Hons) MEng, QC, MD, P.I., shows come along sometimes like the Open Air Theatre’s Jesus Christ Superstar that mean I haven’t written the millionaire supervillain off completely; and I vaguely remember enjoying the Menier Chocolate Factory’s production of Aspects of Love nine years ago. But I think on that occasion I must have just enjoyed looking at Michael Arden for three hours because revisiting it now at Southwark Playhouse it turns out the show is a right turd. This is the latest of Jonathan O’Boyle’s musical revivals to transfer from Manchester’s Hope Mill Theatre, and in fairness I don’t have much issue with the production itself or the cast. Set mainly in France between 1947 and 1964, it begins with 17-year-old Alex (Felix Mosse) getting an Ibsen boner for actress Rose (Kelly Price) and inviting her to spend a fortnight with him at his wealthy uncle’s country house.

Theatre review: Thoroughly Modern Millie

PREVIEW DISCLAIMER: The press night takes place later this week.

After premiering what could well be the best new musical of the year a couple of months ago, the Landor have looked to the past for a follow-up, with a 2000 musical, based on a 1967 film, set in 1922. Thoroughly Modern Millie is something of an oddity: It does feature original songs (by Jeanine Tesori and Dick Scanlan) but these are interspersed with older songs from a variety of sources, from "My Mammy" (most associated with Al Jolson,) here performed in Chinese, to a Gilbert and Sullivan patter song, rewritten to become a boss dictating a letter to his stenographer. The stenographer in question is Millie (Francesca Lara Gordon,) who's moved from Kansas to New York to be a flapper and, in what she believes to be the most modern approach, marry for money. She identifies the suitably wealthy heir to an insurance company fortune, Trevor (Samuel Harris,) and takes a job as his secretary with complete certainty she'll soon be upgrading to his wife.