Anna Francolini, Craig Purnell, Nigel Richards, Jenna Russell

Director Clive Paget
Music director/piano Christopher Frost
Choreographer Jenny Arnold

Part of the Sondheim season at the Bridewell and based on the songs of
Jason Robert Brown, Adam Guettel and Michael John LaChiusa, this revue uses
the set of Sweeney Todd, which is on the rest of the week. There's a fair
bit of emotional mayhem, but the traditional revue approach -- two singers
of each sex in mannered scenes that make a not-too-distorting story out of
two or three songs at a time -- is a odd in the grim context. It's true
that the stairs and upper stage come in handy for the usual revue purposes.
But, while there are a few proper standalone numbers, most of the songs
seem ripped from their dramas; the disiecta membra need a more clinical
setting to avoid seeming hacked about.

This was particularly striking when Craig Purnell and Nigel Richards sang
Daybreak from Floyd Collins, which they previously peformed in the
production last year. The setting in the revue was a man comforting his
brother who was too drunk to move, which made the geological and cosmic
allusions seem bathetic. Somewhat similarly, Way back to paradise, an
explosion of primal anger and a rite of passage for a young woman, became
two women bitching about men at a sitcom kitchen table. The kitchen table
(the one where Mrs Lovett makes her pies) is much in evidence in other
scenes, which tends to domesticate the mythic imagination shared by all
three song writers. This is actually emphasised by the selection of songs,
which blends the cosmic and teleological (The New World, Children of the
heavenly king/At the sounding open each part) with related metaphors for
inner experience and aspirations (Stars and the moon, The world was
dancing, I don't hear the ocean) and direct statements of the same.

Jason Robert Brown comes closest to the direct expressive style of Richard
Rogers, Sondheim without the ironizing self-awareness, for example in You
don't know this man and All the wasted time, two heroic assertions of love
between married people in crisis. Brown is also responsible for the
achingly funny Surabaya Santa, Mrs Claus torching in Berlin-cabaret style.
Adam Guettel, represented here mainly by numbers from Floyd Collins, often
strikingly gets to the inner, physical, rhythms of emotion and mental
disturbance. Saturn returns is a disturbing depiction and analysis of
disturbance. Guettel also has a winning parody in How can I lose you?, a
Sondheim-smart self-analysis in a thirties comic ingenue number (think
Martha Raye), performed by Jenna Russell with supreme goofiness. Michael
John LaChiusa's songs seem to owe more to their words (most of which are
striking) and to suffer most from the loss of narrative context.

The cast are appropriately contrasted, and all first rate. Anna Francolini
with her archaic curls has a touch of the sphinx which can be either comic
or dramatic. Jenna Russell is more centred but also very adaptable. Craig
Purnell is endearingly goofy, and Nigel Richards passionate and angry when
needed. Christopher Frost played the piano and a handful of other devices
in fine style.