‘Triumphant’ was the metaphor most used when ‘Funny Girl’ opened at the Chocolate Menier Factory last year, and that triumph has now seen it blast its way onto the Savoy stage with a glitzy, high profile production that is sure to grab even more headlines on an extended run until October. Was the hype justified? Not just of star Sheridan Smith, but the production itself?Of course no mention of ‘Funny Girl’ is complete without reference to Barbra Streisand, who is, and will be, forever associated with the role of Fanny Brice. And in this instance, in a very strong sense, we have our own ‘Fanny’, a performer whose down to earth, Jill-the-girl persona has won the hearts of legions of fans.
In the story, Fanny Brice has everything – talent, pizazz, a killer smile and most definitely ‘it’. She was born the wrong side of the tracks, and is no ‘Ziegfeld Follie’ but we watch her bulldoze her way not just into the line-up but right to the top of it, and capture the heart of matinee idol Nick Arnstein, with her comical troop of Mother and assorted Aunties following in tow, and her trusted side-kick Eddie. Of course it all goes wrong, and our plucky heroine ends up shedding more than a few tears but would we have it any other way? Probably not.
Smith is a star in much the same vein as Brice, so it ought to be a match made in heaven, and she is indeed endearing and appears to be having a great time up there (perhaps too much), however she is no singer, and the whole point of Fanny Brice is that she defied the odds with not just guts and brawn but pure, unadulterated talent. Streisand of course had it, Smith has to resort to other means and it is not always entirely convincing. Winking at the audience, walking with a chimp’s gait and exorcising your inner Melissa McCarthy is all fine and dandy, and she nails that, but it is vocally a long way short of the mark. There is drama to be had in ‘People’ and ‘Don’t Rain On My Parade’ but the knockout is not there which inevitably leaves a large hole in the soul of the piece. Smith is hardly helped in her endeavours by a 7feet of blandness performance by Darius Campbell as her, and it seems everyone’s, object of desire, spending a good deal of time staring off stage, giving us his impressive but un-expressive profile.
The musical itself is no masterpiece, and whilst a great star vehicle, it has some nice supporting roles. The quartet of older ladies are ably led by Marilyn Cutts as her indomitable Mother, Joel Montague is impressive as best friend Eddie (showing some mean tap moves) and Bruce Montague makes a dashing Florenz Ziegfeld. Not a triumph then, but not a failure either. ‘Funny Girl’ has her moments, just not perhaps enough of them.
In 1927 Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II took the courageous step of basing a musical on Edna Ferber’s novel exploring 40 years of a theatre company ‘s life on a Mississippi Riverboat. By doing so, they set off a chain reaction in the world of musical theatre that proved that this then trivial art form could comment on more serious aspects of the human condition. In Show Boat, alongside the usual but more developed vicissitudes of love, they threw the spotlight on racial prejudices in society.