Roman Holiday
Theatre Royal Bath
BATH Theatre Royal kick off their summer season with their own production, a world premiere of a new musical version of the 1953 blockbuster William Wyler film Roman Holiday. They trawled through the wonderful Cole Porter song album and came up with a mixture of some of the all-time greats in popular music, Night and Day, In the Still of the Night, Just One of Those Things and Easy to Love, and several lesser known compositions that fit readily into the slightly rearranged story. Such a combination looks a sure fire winner. When you add an excellent cast headed by the delightful Rebecca Collingwood, as the runaway Princess Ann, escaping for 24 hours from the prison imposed on her during a goodwill continental tour in order to see the real Rome, and Michael D. Xavier’s handsome American reporter Joe Bradley, who falls in love with her as he mixes business with pleasure on their tour of the Eternal City.
When you let this pair loose on some of those classic romantic songs, particularly Easy to Love, and the typically clever Cole Porter lyrics of the old Gertrude Lawrence hit, Experiment, any fan of the great composer can just sit back and lose themselves in happy memories. It’s a pity that Adrian der Gregorian, playing Joe’s bright and breezy photographer buddy Irving didn’t have a solo number or at least a duet with his song belting girlfriend Francesca played by Tania Mathurin, a new character not in the film. Although it looked as if it was included just to give Tania and the energetic Ensemble a big number, Just One of Those Things, still proved to be a show-stopper.
Another character not in the film is the Princess’s overpowering Countess guardian Aunt. Bringing to bare all the skills acquired from a career stretching back to Alan Ayckbourn’s The Norman Conquests at the Bristol Old Vic, Richenda Carey made every line, especially if there was a sly laugh contained in it, tell.
Richenda’s skills, and those of Tim Frances as the blustering Editor Hennessy, were needed in those dramatic scenes because the one place where the show comes up a little short is in the book. Kirsten Guenther and Paul Blake’s script does not skip along with the same gentle ease as the dialogue supplied by Dalton Trumbo and Ian McLellan Hunter, which gave the film an innate distinctive charm all of its own.
There is still however a lovely feel-good factor in this story, mixed with an expertly created inbred pathos that, to use Cole Porter’s own lyrics “Our Love Affair (Princess Ann and Joe) was too hot not to cool down, So goodbye dear and Amen, here’s hoping we meet now and then, it was great fun, but it was just one of those things” – in this case, one of those enjoyable evenings at the theatre full of wonderful songs and brilliant lyrics, delivered in style by a very talented company.
Roman Holiday runs at the Theatre Royal Bath until July 1. To book tickets visit www.theatreroyal.org.uk