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Actin’
wild as a bug
Dancin' to the Jailhouse Rock to open the show
All Shook Up
Unity Theatre, Liverpool
*****
LIVERPOOL may be the home of
the Beatles, sundry Atlantic shipping lines, the football pools and the
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. But it also boasts two
universities – Liverpool and John Moores, and a drama training college –
LIPA or Liverpool Institute For Performing
Arts – that from this present show looks to be a close match for the
(Royal) Central
School or RADA.
Why? Because this incredibly
polished staging, directed and performed by (mostly, but not
exclusively) Third Year drama students, and produced by three other
young talents who can be credited with getting the show on the road
(Hannah Clements, Helen Crilly and Katie Wood) proved as punchy,
entertaining as witty as any professionally cast Musical I’ve seen in
the past year.
It’s all done on a shoestring,
but then the personnel cost nothing. Hence a terrific nine-strong band
that produced sounds as varied as the aforementioned RLPO; Callum Clarke
directed from keyboard, produced sensational rhythmic dexterity from his
instrumental team, was a master at filling in the strummed interstices
to cover a set change, and doubtless prepared the score – no trivial
matter – beforehand.
Andreas Häberlin was a
virtuosic treat on second keyboard, scampering around scales and
producing vivid, eerie synthesiser effects for ‘If I Can Dream’
(Dean and Lorraine); bwrlin whilst clarinet doubling saxophones - super
for ‘There’s always me’, guitar trio (beautifully articulate;
bassist Danny Miller came shiningly into his own for ‘Can’t Help
Falling In Love’) and some exotic trumpets (fabulously paired for ‘Don’t
be Cruel’ - first whisperings of the ultimate love-tryst), ensured
this show never slept. Time and again, music and visu als
hit you in the solar plexus.
Plus a delicious cast. True, I
didn’t feel any of the chaps, led by Norwegian Inga Bremnes as Chad (the
sort of Elvis Presley clone who sets the touch paper to a sleepy,
conservative mid West town and creates joyous havoc), had mastered
voices – yet - to match the superlative musicianship of the girls. A bit
of work and focusing might go a long way to add a more profound vocal
character, and ensure the voices are decently ‘supported’ so as to come
across with attractiveness as well as their obvious flair.
Chad
played by Norwegian
Inge
Bremnes
But Bremnes here showed
himself a delicious character actor. Chad
electrifies the town and in a way he electrified us, too. ‘Call me the
carefree kind/ I wander with the breeze…/ No job can hold me down, I'm
just a knock-around guy/ Gotta keep a-movin’ east or west/ Till I find
my place….’ The way he interacted – with any available young townsgirl;
with the delicious Natalie, for whom he falls almost unwillingly
(despite ‘And even if a pretty girl should catch my eye I’ll give her a
quick “hello”, and a fast goodbye.’); and with the oldies, especially
the town mayoress who’s a closet sex-starved harridan posing as the
worst kind of ghastly judgmental conservative – was pure joy.
Chad stands up for himself
(‘I’ve hit plenty of friends before’, he adds, before declining to hit
Natalie/‘Ed’). Anyone would go soft for this guitar-toting boyo, driftin’
just like the sand. Outwardly in the know; yet definitely an outsider,
‘other’, he’s innocent, genuine, honest, unpredictable.
So he – Chad - is the
real thing. But so is his actor, Bremnes himself. As the luckless
strummer-cum bummer-around (the lyric quotes above stem from the song
‘I'm just a roustabout’), he has oodles of charisma, and an
elasticity of movement that is, well, pretty sexy. One was intrigued by
the rectangular packet protruding so near his… er… package. We never saw
him smoke, so let’s just assume he came … equipped. But equipped too for
a charm offensive, albeit armed ‘with the libido of an Italian soccer
fan’. With the arrival of ‘C’mon Everybody’ he has the whole town
– and the entire ensemble - afire. ‘Do you hear that? It’s music, and
it’s coming from inside of you.’ No wonder this show was ablaze from
start to finish.
It was notable how despite
being miked, it was lightly handled (Sound Designer: Javier Pando, Sound
Operator and Assistant: Jamie McIntyre, James Roberts). You felt these
singers could have filled the Unity Theatre effortlessly without, and
Musical venues a lot larger. There was a real quality and punch and
joyousness to their delivery. They never shouted and the sound system
never screamed: yet this was Elvis. What a magnificent – rare -
achievement for singers and engineers alike to get the balances so
right.
About this show one thing has
to be clear. Alongside the direction (Sam McKay, utterly in control,
clearly a disciplined motivator, and endlessly inventive within
extraordinarily tight confines) and bursts of choreography (Torie
Holland: several numbers, including the opening quasi-caged ‘Jailhouse
Rock’ performed in civvies, or rather in-jug attire, before the cast
differentiates into characters, excelled), the triumph of this show was
unveiling to us Kristina Humerfelt, another Norwegian, to charm and
delight and dazzle dramatically as the girl at the centre of the story.
Natalie is the most wondrous
girl-boy-garage girl feller. ‘Why wear a dress whe n
you can use it to mend an engine?’ Natalie is the ultimate mechanic, who
can fix a car or a bike (Chad’s
clapped out On the Road machine) at the drop of a hat. She dons blue
overalls and looks – sort of - like a boy. She’s her father’s favourite
daughter-son. And by only the fourth number, ‘One night with you’
(‘Always lived very quiet life I ain’t never did no wrong…’), she had us
eating out of her palm.
Kristine Humerfelt as mechanic Natalie posing as the
indefatigable Ed
The essence of the story is
that she fancies the rocker but he hankers after every other available
girl; that she dons (or retains) male attire/overalls to become his
trusted number 2; and that he, perplexed, falls for her, despite
thinking she’s a boy. Actually she looks scrumptious as either.
Conclusion: ‘I guess there’s only one thing for a guy like me to do and
that’s go and join the Navy’. It’s the most glorious farcical situation,
in the best tradition of Rossini and operetta, Charlie’s Aunt and Whitehall farce – or Rowan Atkinson’s
Blackadder (besotted by ‘Bob’).
But thinly disguised – or not
- under an oily cap as ‘Ed’, Humerfelt was winning, funny, touching.
It’s not a joke that the boy she pines for in that song above dismisses
her with unwitting cruelty. It’s comic, but Humerfelt made that pain
ours. She is a very assured, attractive performer indeed, full of flair,
happy-go-lucky, bright, intelligent, whose (for fear of a cliché)
fabulous sparkling eyes set the auditorium alight.
And if in ‘Follow that Dream’
neither she nor Chad quite nailed it vocally – a bit
iffy, and one of two weaker, not quite on-beam numbers in an evening
consisting largely of hits, the singing was gorgeous thereafter. The
other near-flop, however, was the very last item (bar a curtain call
thrill), ‘Burning Love’: well enough sung, but not arrestingly,
the only moment Holland’s choreography – so brilliant for the duple
‘Teddy Bear/Hound Dog’ and elsewhere - drooped.
But in everything else she
touched Humerfelt shone – and grabbed you - right across the vocal
range, such as in the legendary ‘Love me Tender’, with Matthew
Parkinson’s wonderfully wimpish creation as the never-get-a-girl Dennis
(he does, actually, latterly): the brother-wannabe-lover figure who
brings his own poignancy and a hapless inadequacy that inures him to,
the hard lessons of growing up, was pure joy.
It’s intriguing to think of
Parkinson – as he did – playing Dogberry in Much Ado, probably
very amusingly and ironically indeed - but dogged he was here. He was
also very, very funny, and clever at working out how to be so. Like
several in this cast, he revealed great timing, and in his case,
maturity. You could not not take to Dennis. ‘It Hurts Me’
was one of the show’s best numbers – and it showed: ever loyal (‘But if
you ever tell him you’re through I’ll be waiting for you…’).
But McKay’s cast was riddled
 with
talent. Consider the three girls (Kayleigh Blackburn, Gwennan Jones,
Alice Phillips – second year drama student at John Moores and recently
the ravished teen Wendla in Wedekind’s Spring Awakening), only
briefly the secretary-Norns of the piece, because usually onside, but
splendid as bar-flies and eggers-on and moral supports and a yummily
tongue-in-cheek set of Three Graces statues (‘Let yourself go’) who kept
on switching into life. They were Three Voices too, for I would gladly
cast any of them in a Musical for their beauty and quality of tone –
each different, but akin and fused rather sensationally in trio.
Matthew Parkinson as Natalie's hapless friend Dennis
Both sexes shone amongst the
other parts: Bradley Stoker as Jim (honest Dad with a secret itch) has a
striking voice that doubtless dates back to his playing Bugsy in the bad
boys Musical as a teen; Erin Rowlands as long-suffering barmaid Sylvia
(‘There’s Always Me’, which came across with the aching appeal
and directness of those numbers from Lionel Bart’s Oliver); and
Leela Dawson as boy-rapt Lorraine who dotes on soldier lad Dean, whose
mater won’t let him go (Joshua Glenister, standing in very acceptably:
their duet was ‘It’s Now or Never’, prised by Elvis’s songwriters
from ‘O sole mio’ – some of us know it as ‘Just one cornetto’)
all served up humdinger set-pieces.
That grotesque mother, the
‘clean up town’ Mayor Matilda, got a spiffingly funny characterisation
from Siofra McKeon-Carter, also from John Moores Uni down the road. She
oozed ugly right-wing self-righteousness and a dubious prim morality
that Chad’s libertarian innocence deliciously drives a coach and horses
through; she ends up bedding Earl, the patient, common-sense Sheriff
(Stuart Cullen: ‘A bit of indecency is good for you’); and she had the
best high notes, almost coloratura, in the cast (‘Devil in Disguise’
– ‘You look like an angel Walk like an angel Talk like an angel But I
got wise’ was a thrill).
Rachel Altounian’s Miss Sandra
topped this lot: a rich, almost contralto tone, and attractive, sadly
resigned personality (‘When I wake up and there’s no man on the other
side of my bed, I know it’s going to be a good day’) that simply beamed
out, in ‘Let Yourself Go’ and when supporting Chad and Jim in ‘The
Power of My Love’.
But it’s when Natalie, or
Natalie as Chad’s
‘best mate’ Ed, is onstage that the whole show blossoms. ‘A Little
Less Conversation’ – Ed and company – was plain scintillating; ‘Take
my hand, take my whole life too’, the not-yet-lovers’ preface to ‘I
Can’t Help Falling In Love With You’, exquisitely moved and charged
with undercurrents by Holland and McKay, what I noted down as ‘vocal
choreography’, simply took your breath away.
With ‘Blue Suede Shoes’
– originally (1954) a Carl Perkins number: ‘You can burn my house Steal
my car, Drink my liquor From an old fruitjar…but uh-uh, Honey, lay off
my shoes Don’t you step on my blue suede shoes’ – a neat analogy for
‘occupying my space’ - this irresistible duo, plus Clarke’s perfect
syncopated band of young instrumentalists, served up a musical miracle.
Absolutely sensational, the more so for the surprise of the two at this
fi rst
whisper of (‘gay’?) attraction. Which only proved you can have a kiss
curl and like a feller.
But the chitter-chatter book
(crafted by Joe DiPietro, who ingeniously uses Elvis’s hit songs to
produce a continuous narrative), let alone the lyrics, was a delight:
full of delicious nuggets and really shrewd observation of confused
young people and their almost as confused elders alike. Humerfelt and
Bremnes as straight actors were so alive, and so engaging, and in their
characters’ shy teenage way so cleverly tragi-comical and understated,
they could probably turn out in Ibsen or Strindberg tomorrow.
Siofra McKeon-Carter as the mayor whose propriety hides
a few skeletons in the cupboard
The title, All Shook Up,
had to come from somewhere. It’s echt-Elvis: ‘I’m itching like a
man on a fuzzy tree My friends say I’m actin’ wild as a bug
I’m in love I’m all shook up…oh, yeah’. The start of act II with
this energising number produced the longest sequence of triumphantly
directed, beautifully focused numbers (It Hurts Me’, ‘A Little Less
Conversation’. And it yields ‘I Don’t Want To’, probably
Bremnes’s best number of all, taken at an exquisite slow pace by
Clarke’s stylish, attentive, laid-back, mature-beyond-their-years nonet
(complete with magnetising girl drummer Laura Williams): ‘I don’t want
to let you know how much I want you, I was happy free and easy, could do
the things that please me, I don’t want to get tied down with a girl
like you, I don’t want to …love you, but I do.’ Did he sing ‘a girl’ or
‘a boy’? Either way, who- or whatever the object of his attentions,
Chad’s loneliness is brought home to
perfection by this wan song. Either way, it was magical.
So Bremnes is something of a
star in the making; and Kristine Humerfelt is patently – I think anyone
there would concede – megastar quality already. A beacon. A scrumptious
performer. An onstage sensation.
All Shook Up’s
set was serviceable, consciously plain in an area
constricted by onstage band. Helped by cyclorama garishness, it worked
fine. Along with a serviceable set of props, Designer Anastasia Burton
came up with some appetising, relishable costumes (the obnoxious Mayor’s
yellows, greens and magentas were just perfect, and the threesome
‘Character Chorus’ kept delighting the eye in shifting outfits). The
lighting (Jack Leech) was pinpoint; the set-moving (Richard
Chambers-Fowler and his four-man team) impeccable, tidy, enabling and
unobtrusive.
It’s hard to fault a Musical
where the direction was exemplary throughout, and the dance element so
well-devised and polished. I’ve cursed countless times that there was no
proper cast list in the Programme (though full biogs) and also no
Synopsis (though every song title and its executants admirably listed).
Maybe you can’t have everything. But paradoxically, this utterly
professional show, to my mind, got almost everything right.
Roderic Dunnett
25-05-14
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