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Show Boat
Cape Town Opera
Birmingham Hippodrome
*****
THAT ol’ man river is rolling along
strong as you like in this magnificent production of Jerome Kern’s
landmark 1927 musical.
Cape Town Opera have injected large scale
operatic production values in to a Broadway musical and the result is
simply breathtaking with beautifully sung solos, a soaring, powerful
chorus and lavish sets based around a Mississippi river boat, the Cotton
Blossom.
And then there is Kern’s wonderful music with
songs such as
 Ol'
Man River, Make Believe, Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man and
Bill, the last, incidentally, with lyrics by P G Wodehouse, and
what a difference a 30 piece orchestra makes.
The Cape Town Philharmonic under concertmaster
Patrick Goodwin gave a depth, fullness and richness of sound that no
amount of electronic trickery used by the small ensembles of musicians
usually employed in touring musicals can match. This was the real deal.
The sound, designed by Marcel Bezuidenhout, is
also helped by every member of the cast having their own microphone,
which means more than 50 people miked up – this is a big production and
a technical triumph..
Only make believe: Blake Fischer as Gaylord and
Magdelene Minnaar as Magnolia
The musical, with books and lyrics by Oscar
Hammerstein II is based on the novel by Edna Ferber chronicling life on
the riverboats, the floating gin palaces, saloons and theatres plying
their trade up and down the Mississippi.
On the fictional Cotton Blossom we follow the
lives and fortunes of crew and performers over 40 years from 1887 to
when the show opened. We meet low life like Pete (Jaco Muller) who
exacts his revenge after being thrown off the boat for making passes at
the show boat’s star Julie.
We see the oppressive laws of segregation with
laws against black people marrying whites and even separate box offices
for black and white – controversial subjects in 1927. And when
Julie is revealed to have had a black parent, making her black, her days
as an actress in white middle class plays for white folks are over.
We meet the liberal Captain Handy, played with a
great sense of fun by Graham Hopkins, who goes through life full of
optimism, his prudish and fun unloving wife Parthy (Anthea Thompson)
along with their daughter Magnolia, played by Magdalene Minnaar who is
blessed with the most wonderful voice.
Then there are the artists, the types Parthy does
not want daughter Nola to mix with, particularly Julie, sung wonderfully
by Angela Kerrison. She has a clear, pure voice and her singing of
Bill, slurred at times, as a drunken, night club singer on
her way to rock bottom, raises the hairs on the back of your neck.
It is emotional, sad, beautiful and you
 can
feel the pain of a woman who has lost her husband, her way of life, and
no longer has much to live for.
Then there is Steve, (Stephen Jubber) her
husband, who thinks he can act, but can’t and the comedy duo Frank
(Brandon Lindsay) who always plays the villain, badly, and Ellie, sung
by Catherine Daymond who has a glorious accent tailor-made for silent
movies.
Otto Maidi had the Mississippi echoing to his
magnificent bass voice as Joe
And there is Gaylord, an elegant, handsome
Southern gentleman, and an inveterate Riverboat, race track, saloon,
anywhere gambler who falls in love and then marries Magnolia, finally
leaving her, and his daughter Kim (Caitlin Clerk) six years later after
another bad run of gambling, telling Nola to go home to the riverboat
where she will be better without him.
Blake Fischer has plenty of opera and musical
theatre credentials behind him and you can see why with a pleasant
manner and fine tenor, hitting top notes with ease. His duets with
Minnaar ar a delight.
The real show stopper though, twice, was from
Otto Maidi as Joe, the stevedore, the part written for the legendary
Paul Robeson, who, ironically, was unavailable for the 1927 opening run,
the start of which had been delayed, and di not sing the role until the
London premiere a year later.
Maidi has a voice as rich and deep as the darkest
chocolate and d oes
not suffer from the lack of volume in the lowest register which is the
bane of many a bass – with his power he could have been heard in Dudley.
A big man with a big voice, his first
singing of Ol' man river ended in rapturous applause . . .
except it wasn’t the end, just a pause while the male chorus appeared
toting barges and lifting bales for an even bigger finale and even more
rapturous applause.
Supporting cast and ensemble all play their parts
in what is a stunning production on the grand scale.
Magnolia sung by Magdalene Minnaar) and her father
Captain Andy played by Graham Hopkins
Johan Engels’ set design, well lit by Mannie
Manin, gives us a Riverboat, its theatre, the docks with walls of bales
of cotton, the Trocadero night club, a gambling hall or whatever is
needed with the minimum of fuss while Birrie Le Roux’s costumes are
sumptuous and colourful for the rich white folks at one end and poor and
threadbare for the “coloured folks work on the Mississippi” at the
other, always looking authentic.
The 40 year time span also takes us through
fashion changes from bustles to flapper dresses, demure waltz to
Charleston, while the whole show is lifted by some wonderful dancing
created by choreographer Timothy Le Roux.
Director Janice Honeyman has taken a big show and
made it bigger. Despite a cast to rival Ben Hur everything is slick and
efficient with seamless scene changes and the ham acting of the play on
Cotton Blossom is a delight as is the vaudeville and burlesque style of
the shows on boat and nightclub in the second act.
At the end, 40 years on from when we first
stepped aboard the Cotton Blossom, you have empathy for the characters,
feelings for Gaylord and Nola, about the tragic Julie and the still
optimistic Captain Andy, while Joe tells us that the ol' man river is
still rollin' along. We care about the characters, they have become
friends, and any show can’t ask for more than that.
A spontaneous standing ovation for the opening
night of the short UK tour said it all. It is an expensive and glorious
undertaking by Birmingham Hippodrome and Welsh National Opera to bring
Cape Town Opera to our shores again – a rare treat, so don’t miss the
chance to see them. To 05-07-14.
Roger Clarke
02-07-14
Show Boat sails on to: The Lowry, Salford (Jul
8-12), Millennium Centre, Cardiff (Jul 22-16) and Bord Gais Energy
Theatre, Dublin (Jul 29 – Aug 2)
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