Imelda & Co’s old showgirls are folly good!
Quentin Letts first night review FOLLIES Stephen Sondheim Royal National Theatre ★★★★✩
VETERAN opera singer Dame Josephine Barstow provides the best moment of the Royal National Theatre’s make- or- break autumn musical – a revival of Stephen Sondheim’s bitty Follies. The Dame, perhaps not entirely steady on her feet, is playing elderly former Broadway chorus girl Heidi.
In flowing robe she steps into the limelight front of stage, extends her long neck and froggy lips, and sings One More Kiss. Sondheim can be a frustrating composer, teasing us with kinks and feints, but One More Kiss is melodic, straightforward, lovely.
Old hoofer Heidi, looking back on life, sings nostalgically ‘one more kiss to melt the heart, one more glimpse of the past’.
A younger soprano, representing Heidi in her heyday, joins her in the song. ‘One more souvenir of bliss,’ they warble.
It is a gorgeous moment, made all the better by their elegance, young and old, and for the contrast the aria provides to the otherwise mainly jaunty score. Here is an extravagant, spectacular production of a second-class musical.
The National, needing to prop up its leadership, has spent a fortune on the show: a vast cast, big orchestra, marvellous costumes and a set catching the crumbling grandeur of a New York theatre where impresario Weismann long staged his Follies variety glamour show.
With the building about to be razed for an office block, Weismann holds a reunion for his old showgirls, among them Imelda Staunton’s valiant Sally and Janie Dee’s nicely caustic Phyllis. The plot, such as it is, emerges amid flashbacks and episodic songs as the various retired showgirls give us a turn. Being Sondheim, myriad lyrics are crammed into not quite enough bars of sub-Bernstein music. The cleverness of the writing (as in Ah, Paris!) is undeniable but the evening suffers from a lack of narrative drive.
It is 40 minutes before the house is set alight by Broadway Baby. Other hits include Who’s That Woman?, Loveland (done with chiffon beauties holding big fans) and Losing My Mind, when Miss Staunton’s character, seemingly perky, betrays inner doubts. For years she has nurtured a love for Ben (the admirable Philip Quast). She wishes she had married him instead of the duller Buddy (Peter Forbes).
Regret, nostalgia, decay, failure: despite Dominic Cooke’s spirited production (well over two hours with no interval), the pessimism, particularly about love and marriage, never quite convinces. But there are enough vignettes, not least from the wonderful Dame Josephine, to make the evening linger in the memory.