Starting Here, Starting Now

Waterloo East Theatre

Reviewed – 1st July 2021

★★★★★

“that good, old-fashioned thing—an entertaining, relaxing evening in the theatre”

Waterloo East’s latest production is a delightful revival of Maltby and Shire’s Starting Here, Starting Now. This musical revue, first produced in 1976 in New York, is an economically staged three hander that has lost none of its relevance in the past forty five years. Not surprisingly, its subject is that perennial favorite — love. But it’s not a loose collection of songs about love, or even a story about a star crossed pair of lovers. Instead, Maltby and Shire group their songs by theme. The evening starts off with a collection of songs about the joys (and frustrations) of looking for love in the city; moves on to the sorrows of those unlucky in love, and concludes with eternally hopeful lovers looking for a fresh start. The revue opens and ends where it began — with a spritely rendition of the title song, “Starting Here, Starting Now”. Even without an overarching story to this revue, however, audiences will still relish the dramas that unfold in each song. They range from the ironic to the tragic; from triumph to loss as the seasons turn. There’s even a song about more mundane matters, such as the way in which crossword puzzles can drive a couple apart.

But what makes Waterloo East’s revival of Starting Here, Starting Now worth seventy five minutes of your time is its powerhouse performers. Director Gerald Armin is to be congratulated for putting Nikki Bentley, Noel Sullivan and Gina Murray on stage together. Their combined experience, together with that of musical director Inga Davis-Rutter, means the audience can sit back and relax, knowing that they are in very good hands. Nikki Bentley, last seen as Alphaba in Wicked, is particularly good at the torch song numbers, but she can also be sly and funny, such as the makeover song where she promises to make Gina Murray “beautiful like me.” Gina Murray’s acting chops, in addition to her lovely voice, are seen to great advantage in this show. Good examples are her comic foil to Noel Sullivan’s overconfident suitor in “We Can Talk To Each Other”, and the way in which she packs the small stage with energy in “Watching the Big Parade Go By.” Sullivan, by contrast, doesn’t have quite the range of his fellow performers, but we’re talking about a seriously talented cast here. All three work well together as an ensemble, and together with Inga Davis-Rutter on the keyboards, move effortlessly through the evening.

Starting Here, Starting Now is that good, old-fashioned thing—an entertaining, relaxing evening in the theatre. Perfect for date night, and as an added bonus, you are getting a West End experience at Fringe prices. I call that a very good deal.

Reviewed by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Gareth McCleod

Starting Here, Starting Now

Waterloo East Theatre

Five star shows this year:

Shook | ★★★★★ | Online | February 2021

Bklyn The Musical | ★★★★★ | Online | March 2021

Preludes in Concert | ★★★★★ | Online | May 2021

Reunion | ★★★★★ | Sadler’s Wells Theatre | May 2021

Overflow | ★★★★★ | Sadler’s Wells Theatre | May 2021

Cruise | ★★★★★ | Duchess Theatre | May 2021

In My Own Footsteps | ★★★★★ | Book Review | June 2021

The Hooley | ★★★★★ | Chiswick House & Gardens | June 2021

Bad Days And Odd Nights | ★★★★★ | Greenwich Theatre | June 2021

Click here to see our most recent reviews

Baby

Drayton Arms Theatre

Reviewed – 25th October 2018

★★

“The characters are shallow, the plot non-existent, and the music counterintuitive”

“I’m pregnant” – so say the leading ladies of Baby in its first scene. And its third scene. And its final scene. Actually, the whole show is some variation of “I’m pregnant” or, in at least one case – spoiler alert – “I’m not pregnant”. Can a full-length musical dedicated to the idea of having a baby be boring? Hey, you said it, not me.

Baby was first produced on Broadway, in the 1980s, where it ran, modestly, for less than year. The show oozes an 80s aesthetic, as well as 80s cultural values, and there is a fair number of groans – landlines, moustaches, instances of casual misogyny. (How disappointing that, in the same month that Marianne Elliott took a 70s relic and made it fresh in Company, Baby director Mark Kelly somehow added ten years to his source material).

Baby doesn’t have much of a plot. Three couples learn they are pregnant; two of these pregnancies are unplanned. The couples are spuriously linked through one university where the men work or study, although this link is superfluous; the characters are united and reunited throughout the show by a series of awkward coincidences – bumping into each other on the street, that sort of thing.

The music in Baby is jaunty, except for the occasional wailer, and helps to carry the bizarre current of pep that zips through the score like Larry Bird on Diet Coke. The lyrics do tend to get a bit out there, taking intimate, personal moments, and throwing them into abstraction. Take, for example, the opening number, which I guess is about the process of conception:

Stop the moment, Take it in, Can’t you feel, The change begin?, Don’t you feel, The cosmic surge, As two lives begin to merge?

From my seat in row E there was no cosmic surge, but maybe you need to be closer to the stage.

Considering the drudge that is the source material, the cast do good work. Laurel Dougall as Pam Sakarian, a gym teacher who is desperate to get pregnant, is full of vim and tragedy, and really steals the show in act 2. Holli Paige Farr plays Lizzie Fields, a college student who gets knocked up by her boyfriend, cleverly and with dignity; she rises above the text.

The set design is minimal, but effective, and the costumes certainly bring home the 80s theme, although I can’t for the life of me figure out why the ensemble are so often dressed in baseball jerseys when they are not, in fact, playing baseball.

Baby was not a smash in 1983, and it has even less going for it now. The characters are shallow, the plot non-existent, and the music counterintuitive. Still, there are some good performances in this production at the Drayton Arms, and theatregoers should take note of the names Laurel Dougall and Holli Paige Farr, who, given better material, may one day really be able to send out those cosmic surges.

Waterloo East Theatre

Reviewed – 1st July 2021

★★★★★

“that good, old-fashioned thing—an entertaining, relaxing evening in the theatre”

Starting Here, Starting Now is that good, old-fashioned thing—an entertaining, relaxing evening in the theatre. Perfect for date night, and as an added bonus, you are getting a West End experience at Fringe prices. I call that a very good deal.

Reviewed by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Gareth McCleod

Starting Here, Starting Now

Waterloo East Theatre

Five star shows this year:

Baby

Drayton Arms Theatre

Reviewed – 25th October 2018

★★

“The characters are shallow, the plot non-existent, and the music counterintuitive”

Stop the moment, Take it in, Can’t you feel, The change begin?, Don’t you feel, The cosmic surge, As two lives begin to merge?

From my seat in row E there was no cosmic surge, but maybe you need to be closer to the stage.

The set design is minimal, but effective, and the costumes certainly bring home the 80s theme, although I can’t for the life of me figure out why the ensemble are so often dressed in baseball jerseys when they are not, in fact, playing baseball.

Reviewed by Louis Train

Photography by Thomas Scurr

Baby

Drayton Arms Theatre until 9th November

Previously reviewed at this venue: