Oliver!
Book, Music and Lyrics by Lionel Bart
Reviser and producer Cameron Mackingtossh
Director and choreographer Matthew Bourne
Desiger Lez Brothertson
Chichester Festival Theatre in Association with Cameron Mackingtosh Ltd
Star rating 5
Photographs by Johan Persson
Well, with the dream team of Cameron Mackingtosh, Matthew Bourne and Lez Brotherston on board, this was always going to be pretty special Oliver! And I’m delighted to report that it lives up to every expectation.
From the moment the orchestra (unusually for musicals at Chichester, in a conventional pit in front of the stage) you feel excellence: terrific violin work from Thomas Leate, for example when he’s not on viola or mandolin. It’s a work full of musical colour and conductor Graham Hurman presents it like a gloriously, rich aural painting.
Then the orphans arrive moving to the musical rhythm with such electrically incisive vibrance that you’d know Matthew Bourne was involved even if you didn’t have a programme or hadn’t read the posters. It’s astonishingly arresting both in the opening scene and every time the ensemble melts or bursts onto the stage, thereafter You may have seen Oliver! many times before (and I have) but you’ve never seen it done like this.
Brothertson’s design is integral to the magic. He has worked with Bourne for thirty years so the two strands of the show are impeccably synched. The multi-level set revolves repeatedly to evoke different places: the orphanage, Fagin’s den, The Three Cripples. Mr Brownlow’s home and more with a terrific climax with girders and bridges so that Bill Sikes (Aaron Sidwell – good) can be shot dramatically fifteen feet or so above the thrust stage. The action makes interesting use of the revolve too, for example when Oliver is running away from the undertaker he’s been sold to.
Of course there are no weak links in this cast. Every single actor – including many talented, skilfully trained children – puts in a fine performance. Among these is Simon Lipkin’s Fagin – I think, on reflection, the best I have ever seen in this role, including Ron Moody, whom I saw live in a 1980s revival. He interacts with the audience. He drops in pretend ad-libs, he times every note and word of “I’m Reviewing the Situation” with superb comic timing. This production, incidentally, really brings out the Klezmer (Jewish folk music) elements in almost everything Lionel Bart wrote for Fagin and that’s a treat too
Shanay Holmes gives us a magnificent Nancy, rather more glamorous and less seedy than some interpretations. Her account of “As Long as He Needs Me” is passionate, sustained and powerful. Oscar Conlon-Morrey, who has a rich chocolatey operatic bass voice is splendid as the self interested Mr Bumble who ultimately gets his well-deserved come uppance. And Katy Secombe matches him beautifully as the revolting but flirty Mrs Corney. It’s fun too that, Secombe is the daughter of the late Harry Secombe who played Mr Bumble in the famous 1968 Carol Reed film that we’ve all seen so many times.
Cian Eagle-Service (who shares the role with Raphael Korniets and Jack Philpott) is a charming Oliver, as long as you can go along with the coventional assumption in this show (and in Dickens’s Oliver Twist on which it is based) that 11-year Oliver has somehow acquired RP and perfect manners despite having been in a very ropey Midlands orphanage from birth. Cian sings with fine intonation especially in the challenging “Where is Love?” and nails the right level of wronged innocence.
The Artful Dodger is great part for any young actor and Billy Jenkins exploits it fully. Not only does he do the drawling East End accent and arrogance to the manner born but he dances with very attractive lightness.
The real star of this show, though, is Lionel Bart. Nothing else he did achieved the success of melodious, touching, funny Oliver! in which every number is a showstopper. And this outstanding production celebrates that brilliance and allows it to shine though
It is a cliché – and I don’t usually gush – but you really need to see this show, even if you have to steal a ticket. It is simply a fabulous night in the theatre and a wonderful achievement for Justin Audibert to have programmed this in his first year as artistic director at Chichester.
