GUYS & DOLLS at the Bridge Theatre

★★★★★

“a captivating, energetic show that you’d bet on to run and run.”

The Bridge Theatre’s production of Guys and Dolls opened a year ago to rave reviews and now a new cast continues the party. This show really does feel like a knees up: my cheeks were aching by the interval and even I was persuaded to join in with a celebratory wiggle during the finale. Even if you have never seen this 1950 musical before, the immersive experience draws you into a world of gamblers, showgirls and fervent missionaries, and you will leave humming the excellent songs.

Part of what draws the audience in is the Bridge Theatre set (Bunny Christie), which includes seating on four sides of an immersive area which you can roam around with a standing ticket. Before the start of the show, the central area is laid out like a street map, vendors sell real hot dogs and pretzels from stands to the audience, and the ensemble circulate puffing on stage cigarettes. Bright neon and coloured bulbs (lighting design Paule Constable) decorate hanging signs that transport you to a busy Broadway, New York with the attention to detail on the road markings and sewer covers apparent up close. The immersive audience is encouraged to sit at diner tables and interact with the ensemble as the bustle increases. Given the geography of the room, the orchestra is not in a pit: it is elevated to the gallery, and flanked with more of the garish bulbs which shows off the pink glittery music stands and snazzy audience jackets. This is a show that’s not afraid to show how it operates, but that only adds to the magic.

And what magic. Especially when standing, the action is happening literally centimetres away. The acting therefore must be – and is – flawless. Emotions have to be portrayed both small and large for the audiences closer and those further away. Dancing (Arlene Phillips with James Cousins) from the talented supporting actors is super sharp. I loved the rowdy carrot routine from the showgirls in the Hot Box club. The gamblers in the crap game routines are totally committed even on narrow stage blocks, and the hat-ography is impressive.

Guys and Dolls is known for being the epitome of the comic musical, and the jokes here are mined expertly by the able cast. There is great physicality throughout from all characters, especially the anchor of the piece, Owain Arthur as Nathan Detroit. Timmika Ramsay also has perfect comic timing as Miss Adelaide, the aspiring wife and showgirl, intent on reforming her fiance. Ramsay is wonderful in the role; her voice is powerful and rich, even when singing sitting down, and with a cold!

“This refreshed cast does their material justice, and then some”

As a foil to this couple, Celinde Schoenmaker is excellent as the uptight Sarah, leader of the Mission for Lost Souls. She has an incredibly easy high register, and is able to inject character into her songs as well as excellent vocals. Watching her lose all abandon in Havana is a sight to behold – very reminiscent of having one too many drinks at a wedding. George Ioannides completes the quad at the centre of the story, again excellent vocally. He embodies the smoothness of a professional gambler, but with enough heart that his love story makes sense.

The supporting cast were also excellent, especially Jonathan Andrew Hume as Nicely Nicely Johnson. He leads the rollicking number Sit Down, You’re Rocking the Boat which is the biggest song and rightly gets multiple reprises.

As in previous immersive shows at the Bridge, blocks rise and fall through different scenes and all these potential hazards are well shepherded by stage hands dressed as cops. They get a well-deserved ovation for calmly co-ordinating the standing audience through the piece, as well as managing props and creating runways to the stage blocks for actors. Even watching the stage hands’ work up close doesn’t break the focus: it’s not often that you get to feel like you’re standing in the wings.

Nicholas Hytner’s strong direction combined with the amazing set and choreography bring out the very best of Damon Runyon’s characters and Frank Loesser’s much-loved music and lyrics. This refreshed cast does their material justice, and then some. In fact, Guys and Dolls could only be improved by serving up every audience member a mid-show dulce de leche, but in every other way, this is a captivating, energetic show that you’d bet on to run and run.

GUYS & DOLLS at the Bridge Theatre

Reviewed on 11th March 2024

by Rosie Thomas

Photography by Manuel Harlan

More five-star reviews:

LUCY AND FRIENDS | ★★★★★ | Soho Theatre | February 2024

STANDING AT THE SKY’S EDGE | ★★★★★ | Gillian Lynne Theatre | February 2024

THE BIG LIFE | ★★★★★ | Theatre Royal Stratford East | February 2024

HADESTOWN | ★★★★★ | Lyric Theatre | February 2024

NELKEN | ★★★★★ | Sadler’s Wells Theatre | February 2024

WHEN YOU PASS OVER MY TOMB | ★★★★★ | Arcola Theatre | February 2024

HILLS OF CALIFORNIA | ★★★★★ | Harold Pinter Theatre | February 2024

SELF-RAISING | ★★★★★ | Soho Theatre | February 2024

JEFFREY BERNARD IS UNWELL | ★★★★★ | The Coach & Horses | February 2024

COWBOIS | ★★★★★ | Royal Court Theatre | January 2024

GUYS & DOLLS

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★★★★★

“Nunn’s inspired direction and choices, and the consistently wonderful acting, gives the overall effect of this being one three act play rather than three one act plays”

Kicking off the new decade at the Jermyn Street Theatre is a trio of short, one act plays by Samuel Beckett. A master of solitary minimalism, Beckett wrote many to choose from. The three, compiled and directed by Trevor Nunn for the “Beckett Triple Bill” are, on the surface, quite different from each other and originally written for different media (the stage, television and radio). But Nunn has picked out a common thread of memory and of looking back, allowing them to sit together in illogical harmony as an intimate and seamlessly crafted trilogy. In each play the protagonists are reviewing their lives through their refracted memories. ‘We’ve never been who we think we were once, and we only remember what never happened’. I don’t remember where that aphorism comes from, of course, but it defines the fragile fabric of nostalgia that we all share, and that Beckett so expertly writes about.

“Krapp’s Last Tape” opens the evening. The title of the play seems obvious, that what we are witnessing is the recording of Krapp’s final tape, yet it could also just be his most recent. It is Krapp’s sixty-ninth birthday and he is playing a tape he recorded thirty years earlier, listening with a mixture of contempt and regret. At times he cannot remember the meaning of words he used to use and has to look them up in the dictionary. Afterwards he removes the tape, loads a fresh one and starts recording his older voice, a voice that is scathing about the man he used to be and the man he has become. James Hayes, as Krapp, is captivating; holding the audience tightly in his grasp, even through his long moments of silence. We are as attentive as he is. As he listens, we listen too, and Hayes has the ability to draw us right into the character’s mind.

“Eh Joe” takes us into slightly darker territory. Originally written for television, it translates perfectly to the intimacy of the space. Simon Nicholas’ live, close-up back projection of Joe’s face pays homage to Beckett’s original specifications, but here it is very much a backdrop. We barely notice the camera moving in closer. All our attention is on Niall Buggy who utters not a single word as Joe. Buggy relies on expression alone, and some real tears, as he reacts to the voice in his head. While Buggy is seen and not heard, Lisa Dwan, as The Voice, is heard and not seen. Dwan’s voice is barely above a whisper but it creates a storm in the mind of Joe. Each word a knife going in. A pause for breath, then in again.

Buggy returns for the final round in “The Old Tune”, teaming up with David Threlfall to play Gorman and Cream respectively; two old-timers reunited after many years. Beckett’s radio play injects a small dose of much needed humour to the evening. Buggy and Threlfall are faultless in their portrayal of two bewildered men lost in a modern world that is passing them by – quite literally too with Max Pappenheim’s sound design littering the stage with passing motor cars. The elderly couple remember a time before cars. They remember a lot, but forget just as much too; disagreeing with each other’s memories in a kind of prose version of Lerner and Loewe’s ‘I Remember It Well’. Beckett’s dialogue, often absurd in the extreme, always manages to contain universal themes that we recognise and relate to. The exaggerated nostalgia that provides the comedy is timeless and it still pervades today, having influenced many writers on the way, most noticeably Monty Python’s ‘Yorkshiremen Sketch’.

“Beckett Triple Bill” is an evening of contrast and similarity. I initially set out to appraise each short piece separately, but Nunn’s inspired direction and choices, and the consistently wonderful acting, gives the overall effect of this being one three act play rather than three one act plays.

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Robert Workman

GUYS & DOLLS at the Bridge Theatre

★★★★★

“a captivating, energetic show that you’d bet on to run and run.”

“This refreshed cast does their material justice, and then some”

GUYS & DOLLS at the Bridge Theatre

Reviewed on 11th March 2024

by Rosie Thomas

Photography by Manuel Harlan

More five-star reviews:

GUYS & DOLLS

GUYS & DOLLS

Krapp’s Last Tape – Eh Joe – The Old Tune

Jermyn Street Theatre

Reviewed – 17th January 2020

★★★★★

“Nunn’s inspired direction and choices, and the consistently wonderful acting, gives the overall effect of this being one three act play rather than three one act plays”

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Robert Workman

Beckett Triple Bill

Jermyn Street Theatre until 8th February 2020

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue: