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Bugsy Malone
Presented
by:
Players
Theatre Company
Reviewed by: Robbie Carmelotti
Venue:
The Watson
Theatre, Forest Hill College, Burwood
Date Reviewed:
May 16th 2008
Friday night was the opening night of Players Theatre Company’s
latest venture Bugsy Malone. The show is a gangster-style show
filled with cliché names like Dandy Eyes, Fat Sam, Knuckles and
Blousey Brown, to name a few. The script is a mix of wise cracks,
gun massacre scenes, wannabe performers and of course, romance.
The script itself was very hard to follow, it wasn’t made very clear
who the good guys were, who the bad guys were, or why they are
trying to kill everyone and even the synopsis in the program didn’t
actually tell you what the show is about. So this made enjoying the
witty wise cracks and subtle humour hard to enjoy because it seemed
to come from nowhere and with nothing to back it up. This continued
from start to finish with the show suddenly ending with no warning
and giving no conclusion to any of the debacles that the characters
had gotten themselves into. One minute they were all fighting and
dying, and then they were all singing, dancing and happy with no
resolve to the prior.
So taking into account the script and the young cast, I believe the
production team did very well to get this show on the stage, and I
do not envy all the hard work they must have put in. Forty
performing kids equals many headaches and lots of stressful
rehearsals. So well done team, your hard work was evident.
Musically the show was led by Kate Lawson Gould, and this was by far
a highlight. Her band was tight and well rehearsed; the
jazzy/bluesy/swing music was easy on the ear and a pleasure to
listen to. Her overture prior to the show’s commencement set the
mood beautifully and she had her cast singing their hearts out with
lots of enjoyment.
Joanne Watt was clever to use choreography that was simple yet
effective. She utilised the experienced tappers for some great tap
numbers and put together some very creative showgirl style numbers
that were very together and natural.
Dee Whittington and Michaela Smith co directed the show and did well
with what they had to work with. Their cast generally had accents
down pat, and the lead characters all seemed very in tune with what
they needed to portray. There were some things that intrigued me
with their staging, I’m personally not a big fan of audience
interaction or cast using the auditorium, I’m big on not breaking
the fourth wall and it seemed like every 20 minutes we had kids
running around the auditorium. Also the cast seemed to not interact
with each other much, the bulk of the dialogue was delivered
directly to the audience, I felt like screaming... "talk to each
other damn it".
The lighting seemed to be relatively effective; I think the use of
more haze would have been beneficial, a lot of the effects went
unnoticed because there was no haze to bulk up the colour. This was
a shame because I could see some great ideas that just weren’t quite
giving off the full potential of their intention. The sound was a
little too quiet for my liking, I felt the whole show could have
been a lot louder, at times it was impossible to hear what was being
said, I made up the synopsis in my head, and boy was it hilarious.
Mario Mohorko was the set designer, and it was an extremely useful
set that provided great scenery and a back drop for the show.
Because the sets were so big we did have quite a few drawn-out set
changes to sit through, but the effect once lights were up made it
well worth it. Well done.
The highlight for me was ‘Tomorrow’, predominantly for the great
staging. The singer, Hamish Gould, held a strong old Broadway style
twang in his voice that really suited the song well, he was
accompanied by a great little dancer, Sebastian Geilings, who danced
the whole number as the bartender, and this young guy has talent
with a great technical base he was performing some excellent ballet
and contemporary moves that helped make the number funny and
entertaining.
Jessica Rae King played Tallulah, the club’s diva and she played it
with ease to a believable standard, without going over the top.
Daniel Ansell as Bugsy Malone and Georgia Wilkinson who played
Blousey Brown, as the lead duo they provided laughs and good
chemistry and they both sang and acted their parts very well.
Georgia’s classical voice felt a bit out of place in this type of
show, and would more suit something like La Boheme (One Day...) than
old school Broadway!
Ben Toscano played Fat Sam and really stole the show for me. He did
a great job with the comic timing of the role and it was clear he
was enjoying every minute of his role.
Congratulations to all the kids involved you have done yourselves
proud. It was clear how hard they had all worked as the curtain
closed and the cast screamed with excitement. I assume this is the
first ever show for the majority of the cast and it was so great to
watch people on stage genuinely enjoying the rush, and fighting
their nerves to put on a great performance.
Robbie is a Professional Latin Dancer/coach and adjudicator by
trade; he is currently teaching some of the country’s leading
youth and amateur competitors. He has travelled through Europe
and
Asia
with touring dance shows, as well as to compete and lecture. He has
won many championships including the
Thailand
International and he has been an Australian rep to the World Latin.
Theatrically he has directed and/or choreographed shows like Hearts
on Fire, West Side Story, Disco Inferno and Hansel and Gretel
as well as played Bernardo in WSS, Don, Greg & Mike in A Chorus
Line, King Herod in JCS. He is currently rehearsing the role
of Mungojerrie in WTC’s CATS which opens in June.
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