Disco-ver and out: musical fails to raise temperatures

SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER, THE MUSICAL

THE history notes in the programme point to the fever that was Saturday Night Fever – the dancing and the dancer who brought us that famous strut. And that’s your dilemma from the start.

You don’t just want a facsimile of John Travolta’s Tony Manero, but you have to have the strut and the swagger. Buys is an extraordinary young performer and it’s going to be fun to watch him grow – on stage. He’s already been given yet another big role in Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (see story). He has beautiful stage presence, can dance and reaches into the emotional beats of a song.

But in this one he needed some serious attitude that would become The Man as he moves into his kingdom – the dance floor. Yet that seemed missing in general, all around – an energy with which the performers could take the stage and make it their own.

There are many contributory factors. This DIRECTOR: Greg Homann CAST: Daniel Buys, Brandon Lindsay, Keaton Ditchfield, Steven van Wyk, Matthew Berry, Clint Lesch, Mark Richardson, Craig Urbani, Charmaine Weir-Smith, Bongi Mthombeni, Natasha van der Merwe, LJ Neilson, Sebe Leotlela, Cameron Botha, Kiruna-Lind Devar VENUE: Opera, State Theatre UNTIL: October 9 RATING: ★★★✩✩ is not an easy musical to stage. Apart from all the iconic potholes lying in wait, it’s put together episodically with scenes changing constantly from the kitchen to the dance floor, from the bedroom to the bridge, and from the studio to the street. To create all those settings, Denis Hutchinson came up with a brilliant set that towered from the floor to what seemed three stories up and filled that space magnificently.

But not to be overwhelmed by that magnificence, the story had to fill out the rest, the actors/singers/dancers (yes, this is triple threat for most of the cast and they shine) had to take on that stage. It’s not that they don’t give their best, there are great performances all around, but perhaps Urbani as the camp dance instructor is the best example of what it takes. You have to go larger and louder in this kind of space.

With “fever” the operative word, anyone who remembers a ’70s disco scene will know the music, the thumping and pumping of those rhythms, seemed to start at the bottom of your soles and then move up. Here, the sound (or really what seemed more like a lack of it), turned the voices right down. In one of the later disco scene songs, where Mthombeni is joined by Leotlela, the only reason one knew she was also singing, was the movement of her lips. Her voice simply didn’t come through and her singing partner’s wasn’t doing that well either.

It wasn’t their voices, they both know their stuff. The sound just didn’t match what should have been the magic of the moment. Some of it came together in the finale, but that’s way too late.

The dance floor is where these Brooklyn kids made their stand. This is where they know all the moves and where they start building their dreams of crossing the great divide – the bridge which takes them to Oz.

If that isn’t working, the holes in between start gaping and the cohesion just wasn’t there. Turning up the volume when necessary will make all the difference. With the more intimate solos by Neilson, Devar and Buys where the accompaniment is quieter, their voices shine spectacularly and yet that sparkle all diminished when it should have been at its brightest.