Hello, Dolly! review
WE open with Dame Imelda Staunton’s irrepressible Dolly locking up her mourning dress, searching for a sign from her late husband that she’s doing the right thing.
That first song, one of a bouquet of compositions is called Just Leave Everything To Me and it is the musical’s way of establishing Staunton as the widowed matchmaker – used to arranging everything –”furniture and daffodils and lives”.
A glorious, defiantly old-fashioned West End revival of the 1964 musical with lyrics and music by Jerry Herman and book by Michael Stewart reasserts the show’s status as arguably the most beloved musical comedy of all time.
Indeed, it was adapted from Thornton Wilder’s play “The Matchmaker,” which grew out of his “The Merchant of Yonkers,” itself adapted from an 1842 Austrian reworking of an 1835 American one-acter.
“Some people paint, some sew. I meddle!” declares Dolly, in late 1800s New York, terrorising Andy Nyman the curmudgeonly half-a-millionaire Horace Vandergelder. His Penny in My Pocket is excellent. (He believes a woman’s place is unblocking his drains.)
In the title role, Staunton proves that she is more than qualified to inhabit iconic diva Dolly, gifted with exceptional comic timing: the cast bend around her: She’s like a welcome breeze.
The 21-piece band here – conducted by Nicholas Skilbeck – sounds divine at the London Palladium.
Among the supporting cast strong-voiced standouts are Harry Hepple and Tyrone Huntley as Horace’s disgruntled employees, Cornelius Hackl and Barnaby Tucker, who end up in the New York hat shop of beguiling Milliner Jenna Russell’s Irene Molloy and Emily Lane’s Minnie Fay.
The plot is simultaneously light and philosophical, like a lot of Jerry Herman’s musicals: Big questions are raised and then dispatched with a one-liner, only to keep chipping away at our hero until a happy ending occurs.
Dominic Cooke’s irresistible production has at its centre the transforming talent of the choreographer Bill Deamer.
Deamer knows that the musical numbers are not always about performance or technicality or vocal range; they’re about feeling. He seizes on Herman’s brilliant patter and razzmatazz and puts them into 3D. He makes sequences grow effortlessly out of tableaux.
Working on familiar territory, Follies Director Cooke dreams up an assortment of colourful scenes and sets them spinning at a screwball tempo.
The artifice lies in the gorgeous colours, the suave scene changes and the art deco vibrancy. This is the kind of show at which his ensemble company excels.
Designer Rae Smith seems to have got the message. Only the pastel tones of Jon Clarke’s chalky lighting design match her for colour.
‘MONEY, pardon the expression, is like manure,’ says the silver-tongued socialist.
Dolly adds: “It’s not worth a thing unless it’s spread around, encouraging young things to grow.”
The weaknesses of the production are some of the sparse early scenes, and fitful video projections by Finn Ross. Love Look In My Window at the start of Act 2 doesn’t quite work. By the end, those quibbles vanish under a spell of enchantment.
“You’re still glowin’, you’re still crowin’, you’re still goin’ strong,” the dancing waiters sing to Dolly. It’s a sentiment that applies wholeheartedly to Staunton as well.
At resplendent Harmonia Gardens, tray-dancing waiters Louie, Manny, Danny, Hank, Stanley help her down the stairs: the key thing about Mrs Levi is that she knows all of their names. Splendid.
In a show designed for its protagonist repeatedly to break the fourth wall, Staunton gets the laughs – particularly in Act 2 – with her snappy delivery, warmth and restraint.
Elsewhere, So Long Dearie comes up fresh minted and is one of the high points of the production.
It would take a heart of stone to resist this musical. Bravo!
At the Palladium, London, until 14 September
**************************************************
I hate name dropping, obviously. But I spent the interval of Hello, Dolly! unexpectedly talking with award-winning Director Jamie Lloyd (Sunset Boulevard).
This must be your idea of hell…’ I asked
‘Oh, no. Not at all,’ Lloyd replied.
‘The world needs a Jamie Lloyd production of Hello, Dolly! With machine guns, balaclavas and blood,’ I added.
He laughed.
‘Carl,’ said Lloyd. ‘If I ever do a Hello, Dolly! I’ll make sure that I put YOU on the front row!’
