A Chorus Line, 26/09/2024

Music by Marvin Hamlisch

Book by James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante

Lyrics by Edward Kleban

Matthew Spalding, musical director

Ellen Kane, choreographer

Nikolai Foster, director

Like, I imagine, many others present tonight, my sole experience of A Chorus Line has been the Richard Attenborough film version which, at the time (1985, ten years after the original stage production), was heavily criticised.  Nevertheless, having enjoyed the film, the prospect of seeing something rather closer to the original was definitely appealing, and this production, originally staged at the Curve Theatre, Leicester, at the end of 2021, came highly praised.

Rather than telling one story, A Chorus Line is a day-in-the-life affair, seventeen hopeful dancers, Broadway 'gypsies', auditioning for a new show, contending for a mere eight places.  The difference for these hopefuls is that the director, Zach, rather than just evaluating their dancing, or running a few lines of the script, wants to get to know them more as individuals, even as he tells them that they must become an integrated ensemble, no one performer 'sticking out' from the others.  These are not aspiring beginners - a couple of them are, certainly, but there are others over 30, for whom the end of their career is fast approaching, and for whom this might, indeed, be the last chance.  It creates a subtle and complex mix of hope and despair, enthusiasm and grim determination.  

The setting is not a bare stage, but an undressed one, cluttered with boxes and risers, the flies full of lighting rigs, the back lined with the mirrors of a practice room.  Director Nikolai Foster has chosen to keep its 1975 setting, because the text has retained its period references - Robert Goulet, Jill St. John, the Ed Sullivan Show, smoking - but David Shrubsole has done a deft job of re-orchestrating Hamlisch's score for a 7-piece band that nevertheless sounds very rich, but not dated, and yet retains that honky-tonk touch that Hamlisch had from his work on Scott Joplin's rags for The Sting.  

This is a story about dancers, and yet they do more singing than dancing, in the long run.  Most of the singing was passable, rather than anything more, save for Jocasta Almgill's Diana, who was excellent.  Rightly so, because Diana has two of the strongest numbers in the whole show, the 11 o'clock anthem "What I Did For Love" (which, as a song, leaves me cold, but was well delivered), and her personal number "Nothing", which was outstanding.  The group dancing was very strong, and Redmand Rance, who as Mike Costa gets the real showstopper solo of "I Can Do That", was also excellent.  However, that was where I began having some doubts about Ellen Kane's choreography.  "I Can Do That" was delivered as a kind of silent tap number, by which I mean the steps were visibly tap steps, but performed without the tap shoes for the sound. There were other places where I saw that silent tap effect too, and it always bothered me.  The other dance number that bothered me was Cassie's "The Music and the Mirror", which I felt was not nearly spectacular enough, nor expressive enough for this character.  That said, the finale, "One", with the cast resplendent in their gold costumes, was a proper eyeful, and very enjoyable.

"One" (finale), The Company
A Chorus Line (© 2024)

Binding all these characters together is the director Zach, mostly a vocal identity, although Foster puts him physically on-stage a good deal of the time.  Adam Cooper is a suitably strong, authoritative presence, but I wasn't feeling any special chemistry with Carly Mercedes Dyer's Cassie.  There were also times, when we were just hearing the voice, when I would have liked a little more expressivity in it, especially a little more humour.  Where he did excel was in the show's emotional heart, in the scene with Paul, which was very well delivered both on Cooper's, and on Manuel Pacific's (Paul) parts.

This was not quite the exhilarating experience I had hoped for, but it was a well-performed and enjoyable night at the theatre.

[Next 29th September]