Another Opening - of a rather good show...
From operetta to musical comedy, and Kiss me Kate at the Barbican.
This partly backstage story of a 1948 US production of a musical version of The Taming of the Shrew (with the two leads formerly married and at odds with each other) is packed with hits – ‘Another Opening, Another Show’; ‘Too Darn Hot’ and of course ‘Brush up your Shakespeare’ to name but three.
Adrian Dunbar plays the lead/ Petruchio – and his stage experience gives real merit to the latter – even though his singing isn’t really up to the standard of top West End Musicals (and he isn’t a dancer).
The rest of the cast are Musical Comedy stars (Stephanie J. Block; Charlie Stemp; Georgina Onuorah; with the actor Peter Davison in a cameo and with Nigel Lindsay and Hammed Animashaun as the comic gangsters) and the singing and dancing of them and the chorus is otherwise first rate. This is always a great comic musical, and the Barbican sets and staging are no hindrance to this (indeed they're rather good!).
[NB the somewhat 'difficult' content and theme of 'The Taming of the Shrew' was addressed through the Fourth Wall, but, referring to 1948 norms of behaviour, somewhat (comically) obliquely]
Running to mid-September.