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Mickey Jo (0:56)

Show a little more, show a little less. Fire the original creative team and rework the material so it's almost no longer recognizable welcome to Burlesque. Oh my God. Hey, welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. Or hello to you if you're listening to this on podcast platforms. My name is Mickey Jo and I am obsessed with all things theatre and today I am going to be letting you know. Drumroll please what I thought of the West End opening of Burlesque, the musical adaptation of the film starring Christina Aguilera, who is also a producer on on the stage adaptation, and Cher, who seemingly wants nothing to do with it whatsoever. But that is a different conversation for another time, one which I dipped my toe into a little bit around 24 hours ago when I shared an update about the alleged backstage drama taking place around this production and the conversation which it has found itself embroiled in for some weeks now. And relevant and fascinating as I think all of that is, that is not what I'm going to be discussing today. If you want to know about what may or may not be going on behind the scenes at Burlesque, you can go and check out the video or podcast that I shared yesterday. Today it's time for my review. I saw the press night performance earlier this evening. What did I actually think of it? And on this particular occasion, because right now it's just after midnight and a handful of other reviews have already begun to drop. I am so fascinated, even more so than usual, to know what you thought of this show if you have had the chance to see it already. Did you see it in Manchester in what was, I gather, a very different version with an entirely different creative team and many different principal cast members. Have you seen it already in London? What do you think of the show? What star rating would you give it if you were giving it a full review? In the meantime, I'm very excited to share my thoughts with you and if you enjoy listening to them and you want to know my thoughts about other upcoming West End and Broadway shows, make sure you're subscribed right here on YouTube. You can go and check out many previous reviews that I have here. You can turn on notifications so YouTube lets you know every time I share a new one. Or you can follow me on podcast platforms where I share almost exactly the same content but without the snazzy jackets. For those of you just listening to me today, it's a really wild silver leopard print number, almost too loud even for burlesque. But I ask you, when am I going to get the chance to wear something like this? Certainly not to Les Mis. Anyway, all that being said, earlier this evening I walked down the pink carpet at the Savoy Theatre and the company proceeded to show me how they burlesque. Let me tell you what I found out. So Burlesque is the highly anticipated stage adaptation of the film of the same name, which was written and directed by Stephen Antin, who has also adapted his own screenplay for this production as serving as one of the show's producers. And ordinarily that is something that I consider to be a little bit of a red flag in the world of musical theater. And right now in particular, you know, this is one of a whole handful of screen to stage musical adaptations that we have seen. Clueless, currently running in the West End, although set to close later this summer, the Devil Wears Prada, Mean Girls was just here. Back to the Future continuing to play Moulin Rouge, continuing to play Death becomes Her doing very well on Broadway, possibly transferring over the Atlantic. Mrs. Doubtfire not too long ago at the Shafts for a Muriel's Wedding not too long ago at Leicester Curve. The list objectively goes on and on and on. And if there's one thing that British and West End theatre audiences seem to really enjoy, it's one of their favourite musicals suddenly realised on stage. And as I was saying, the red flag when it's the same person adapting the screenplay for the stage for me is usually that they don't change enough, or that they don't have the requisite insight into the differences in how you can write for this very different medium. This may even go the other way because this change a really surprising amount, an astonishing amount. And if you are potentially going to see this, if you're thinking about buying tickets as a burlesque purist, that feels like Something I need to make you aware of. Right up top. The biggest change, and this is obviously going to be a spoiler for the show, admittedly one that is revealed very early on, is that the key relationship at the heart of the thing between the Ally character played on screen by Christina Aguilera and the Tess character played on screen by the one and only Cher, is now quite different in the film. It was a sort of a surrogate mother daughter thing. She didn't want her to perform at the club. She wasn't interested. And then she overheard her singing in that Christina Aguilera way that she does, and she was like, how come you didn't tell me you could sing like this? And then she auditions and all of this happens and they come to understand each other a little better. It's very. If you think about it, Dolores and Mother Superior in Sister act, this surrogate mother daughter thing that they have going on in the film becomes more literal on stage. Because the whole reason in this version that Ali goes to New York, goes to the club and seeks Tess out in the first place is because it's been revealed to her, unbeknownst to Tess, that she is in fact her long lost mother. This very shortly after the death of the woman who Ali believed to be her mother, who has been raising her for all of these years, which it's worth noting. She does not take almost any time to grieve throughout this show. I mean, she's too excited to be becoming a burlesque performer, which I'm sure is everything that her late adoptive mother wanted for her in life. Raising her in a religious community in Iowa. That's another new element of her backstory as well. We meet her having a bit of a Sister Mary Robert moment, riffing and singing too loudly in a church choir, and, you know, clearly having far too much talent that needed somewhere to go. She needed to be able to express herself. And burlesque happens to be the answer, because as we all know, when your vocals are too prevalent for the gospel choir that you're a part of, you obviously turn to burlesque. Anyway, Ali arrives in New York, and due to Tess's indifference and disinterest in having a conversation with this random girl who turned up and then accidentally stained a garment backstage, she doesn't get the chance to tell her that she believes that she is her daughter, even though she's wearing around her neck a key on a chain that Tess Nose that she gave to her daughter. We're not going to worry too much about that. There's also a letter that she has written at some point ahead of time that Tess hasn't opened. And this in navigable junction of conversation continues for quite a long time until we reach a point where Ally simply stops trying to tell Tess who she is, even though they have grown closer at the club. Because just like in the movie, Ally eventually becomes a performer when they find out just how talented she is. Now, here is another big difference, because in the film, Cher's character, character Tess, is the only one who actually sings at the club. And everyone else is lip syncing to pre recorded vocals, not their own. But Christina's character obviously has this huge voice. And that is a big point of insecurity for the other performers, particularly the headliner Nikki, who doesn't have a great attitude to work in the show. Meanwhile, their paradigm is pretty similar. But nobody is lip syncing. Everyone is a fully singing burlesque performer. In fact, there's one who has an operatic background and sings in that kind of a style. Given that this is a musical theater interpretation of the show, that kind of makes sense. And you could still do something with lip syncing, but it would be a little bit dubious that would. It would be a challenge to try and recreate something like that on stage and explain it and put it across without just limiting how many of your characters actually get to sing in this musical. Speaking of which, let's talk about the songs now. Many of those that you may know and love from the film are retained for this. Some of them are reworked. There was a whole lot of hoopla about the possibility of the Diane Warren written song, you haven't seen the Last of Me, of course, also included in the musical, the Cher show being removed from this production, and I believe it was in early previews, perhaps begrudgingly, and after she shared some thoughts about this in no uncertain terms on social media, the song is now back in the show. And the new song, I think it was called Masterpiece, which had replaced it, which contained the lyric, you haven't seen the last of me, but was a very different song, which Orfeh performed a few weekends back at West End Live, that is now gone. And instead she sings, you haven't seen the last of me in the first act for perhaps a minute and a half. It is a very reduced cut of the song. We don't have the whole introductory verse. I don't actually think we have either of the verses. It just begins with, I've been brought down to my knees. And then we get as far as the end of the chorus. And then we get a moment into a key change and a big resplendent ending and or face. Sounds fantastic, but it is a little bit like showing up at a fancy restaurant and just being served dessert when you were kind of expecting the opportunity to also have a main course, a starter even, dare I say, but really, at the very least something savory before someone just shoves a piece of cheesecake in my face. And it has been a very long time since I saw the film upon which this is based. But I did recognize a great many of the songs, particularly the Christina Aguilera song numbers. And Jess Foley, who, interestingly, was originally brought into the show as a young songwriter and then subsequently took on the role of Ali Rose, sings them phenomenally. And that is not an easy vocal to put across. That is not an easy artist to emulate. And it's not just that she's doing a Christina impression. She sounds unmistakably unique and like herself when she's singing her own song that she has written for the score, a sort of I want song that appears early in the first act called Got It all from youm. As she's singing about her own personality and theorizing about the relationship she could have with her mother, Tess, on her way to go and meet her, traveling to New York. Incidentally, also the only song of Jess's composition to be left in the score. I think there were more that have been removed. But it's when she does the Christina riffs and runs that she sounds very much like her. She very much lives up to the audacious expectations that come with that vocal performance. I mean, how many people can convincingly do Christina Aguilera on stage? Not many. At which point I feel we should also acknowledge how well cast Orfeh is as Cher. Now, this is a big casting pivot from the regional premiere production in which Jackie Burns was playing the role, possibly aged down a little bit from the film because they now have the real life mother daughter of it all all. And Tess talks about having had Ali, her daughter, at a very young age, an age at which she was not yet ready to be a mother. And now that Orfeh is playing the role, it feels like that pendulum has swung back in a very share direction. You can feel the share influence in Orfeh as an artist. It feels like a little bit of a tribute, but she is another one who is unmistakably original. And if you know Orfeh's work, she's a little bit of a theatrical Legend having starred in Saturday Night Fever on Broadway, as well as Legally Blonde, Tony Award nominated for her performance as the original Paulette in Legally Blonde. Also having appeared in Pretty Woman, all of them, it's worth pointing out musical adaptations of films, then you may be familiar with her theatrical legacy as something of a musical theater heavyweight. And if you're a big fan of hers, this is one of those great moments when you can go and really bask in that. Because she's giving a very Orfeh esque performance on stage. We'll talk more about it later on. But she's very well cast here and she sounds fantastic in what brief vocal moments she has. And this is worth talking about, I think, as we address the changes to the narrative. Because not that I think Cher had that many moments in the film, but even just. It seems like a small and trivial thing, even just in having that moment with you haven't seen the Last of me because it's so. Aside from the quality of the rest of the songs in the film soundtrack, it was such a standalone breakthrough moment that afforded her just for those few minutes as we sit still and focus on it, as she sings this powerful emotional ballad that bizarrely, was a rehearsal for the next night at the club and was, you know, was never going to play well to that burlesque audience that afforded her a great amount of dramatic thrust. And she loses that thrust in the stage production, both because that moment is diminished. And we cut away from her so often and she feels a little bit sidelined on stage, both in the way it's written and in the way it's directed, but also because her introduction, the first moment in which we meet her is not particularly impactful. So often I go and see shows and the first number happens and I'm like, that was a decent opening number. And then the opening of Act 2 happens and I'm like, wow, that just punched me in the face. And I always think that was the energy we needed at the start of Act 1. Sometimes I think that literally should have been the opening to Act 1. And I think it's an overcorrection sometimes because Act 2 openings are so hard to write. And they know they need to recapture that audience energy after a break. And it's such a dynamic and explosive act two opening. And the one in the first act isn't necessarily. And I think that hurts our relationship to Tess as played by Orfeh. I want her to feel like the central queen. I want her to feel like the real leader of this club, like it all falls to her. And because Todrick hall is playing Sean, the Stanley Tucci role from the film, as well as directing, choreographing, and having co composed much of the score, including the vast majority of songs which have remained in the score. Also emceeing and introducing the whole show to the audience, and playing a couple of other characters, including Ms. Loretta, who is the choir leader at Ali's church back in Iowa. He feels very much like the leader of the burlesque club, even though he isn't. He sort of becomes the MC from Cabaret Esque. He also fronts a huge production number telling Ali about the history of burlesque and putting that all across. And because we only experience Tess in moments of financial challenge and criticizing her staff, and we never see her like teaching choreography or, you know, engaging with them in the same way that he does and really helping them fix problems, she's only ever running around being like, the show's happening. Where's Nikki? Who's done this? I have to pay these bills. Why is my ex husband here? Stop bartending with your clothes on, etc. Etc. She sort of just feels like a stressful HR representative or that person in a restaurant that tries to come in and run everything when they really have no idea what's happening because they're not the usual manager. And I don't think that's how we want the character of Tess to feel. Now, speaking of semi clothed bartenders, we should also talk about Jackson, who is the love interest for Ally. He is retained entirely from the film. They even recreate the cookie box moment in which he's not wearing anything, but he's holding a box of cookies in. In a very specific location. I don't know that that really adds anything. And I also don't know that it's an iconic enough moment that they felt like they had to keep that in. And there's like sensual enough and charming enough moments between the two of them. We've already bought into their relationship at this point. The chemistry between them is really good and some of the writing between them is very charming. I just don't think we need the cookie box moment. And it comes after an extended romantic duet that turns into a burlesque fantasy dream sequence number and goes back into duet between the two of them. And then we have what we feel like is going to be a blackout conclusion to the scene. But they stay there, start singing another song, and then he disappears to go and take all his clothes off and re enter with a box of cookies in front of a private location. I just think it's a strange choice. And listen, if we really need to trim minutes from what was a three hour running time during previews, cut that instead of the verse of youf Haven't Seen the Last of Me. Like, there are clear preferences here in terms of what is actually more important to the show. Now, I mentioned that Todrick had written a great many new songs for the show. Many of these are burlesque production numbers within the club. There is something of a plot line about the nature of these performances changing once Ali replaces Nikki as the headliner and Ally brings with her new ideas. Despite having not really known anything about burlesque and possibly about performing arts outside of the context of a church choir whatsoever, she somehow revolutionizes the way that they are doing burlesque, which was already, admittedly pretty trendy. And the costuming doesn't change all that much. There's something about really, it's the lighting, I think, that changes more so than anything else to indicate that they've now updated the way that they do burlesque in the club. But this is where it starts to once again feel a little bit Sister X to me. Because she comes in and she's like, there aren't enough people here. We're going to get more people into this club by doing things in this new way. And Tess is the Mother Superior character who is resistant to change. But everyone falls in love with Ally, and Tess ultimately gives in to that. And what the heart of this story probably, probably ought to be compounded by the actual mother daughter relationship of it all is the coming together of these two women. We don't really feel that here. It's almost as though in all of this adaptation and the changing creative team and all of these tweaks to the material, they perhaps haven't had the conversation of what is actually the important, enduring message of this show. What was the enduring message of this film? And I think the best answer to this might be something about chosen family and kind coming together and this space that was culturally important, but more so was important to all of them as artists and as this sort of chosen family. And we don't get a strong enough sense of that in the musical, sadly. And that is because the whole thing does sort of lack an element of substance. Don't get me wrong, it is stylish as all hell, but as glittable manufacturers have known for years, there's no point making the exterior as shiny as you can if it doesn't have a robust shape. And to circle way back to my original point, which I have long since lost sight of. It is puzzling that this is the writer of the original screenplay adapting his own work. And it feels so estranged from the tonal quality of the original. It feels a lot more glitzy and a lot more sort of squeaky clean and, you know, played for laughs as well as evading any sense of conveying any kind of a decent emotional message. And I appreciate this does not need to be an intellectual, hard hitting or meaning show like the original film I don't think is an enduring cinematic classic. I enjoy it a lot. Don't Hate me. But I always thought that it was, and this is said with kindness. Slightly trashy, slightly campy, but very fun. And those are also qualities with which I can describe this production. And don't get me wrong, the show has already sold well and my expectation is that over the course of the summer audiences are going to be coming to see this at the Savoy and having a fantastic time. I think people are really going to enjoy this for what it is. Let me tell you a little bit more about why. So as of right now, I have no idea what it says in the title of the video or the podcast episode that you're watching because I haven't fully settled on a star rating yet. I'm at war with myself about this one because there are objective shortcomings in the material and yet the entertainment factor is so spectacularly high when it all works. And the difference between something like this and A Devil Wears Prada or A Doubtfire or a Clueless or A Pretty Woman, which I would characterize as other fairly generic film to stage adaptations, and I've said as much when I've reviewed those shows before, is that this one has a more obvious predisposition to musical theatre performance. Devil Wears Prada has a sensibility where it is standing still and posing and glueless. Yes, it's like fun high school party scenes, but burlesque has the opportunity repeatedly and often to put across these huge, satisfying, crowd pleasing, high energy musical numbers full of choreography. And that is always a very winning thing to be able to deliver. And it is packaged and delivered extraordinarily well. This is where director Todrick hall really comes into his own, I should say director and choreographer and co star and co writer Todrick Hall. And to talk a little bit about his overall contributions to the show as a creative, I do think that it feels familiar of Jerry Mitchell direction, especially Jerry's last few stage projects with Boop and Prada And Pretty Woman and it's light hearted and it's entertainment focused and it is characterful. But the principal focus does seem to be really nailing these huge moments of vocals and choreography with eye catching costumes worn by an eye catching ensemble of really sensational dancers, which I would love to say is representative of diverse body types. But it feels more like there is some very limited tokenistic representation. And not as far as the male ensemble goes. But we get full out production numbers which do evolve a little bit as Ali joins the club and the nature of them does shift a little bit. We also get a really spectacular sequence, probably the strongest moment in the show as far as the musical numbers go, in which Todrick joined by the dancers at the club, Club teaches Ali about the history of burlesque and the thrill of burlesque. This is a really fantastic moment. And in order to keep the whole thing moving, we also see a handful of little snippets, short performances, little pastiche burlesque musical numbers performed by the various different characters at the club. And I like that we get a chance to meet so many of these and that they have their own distinct personalities. What I will say is that even in these moments, but particularly in the longer extended production number with Ali fronting them or with Todrick fronting them, it doesn't really feel like burlesque. And that's because it isn't really burlesque. It's the musical theatre interpretation of burlesque, queer pop music with contemporary queer choreography and they are wearing suggestive outfits and there's corseting, but it doesn't really feel true to the nature of what burlesque is. Even though the aesthetic looks right, it's more like it's just Moulin Rouge basically, with a little bit less red involved. Except. Except for one moment when Jake Dupri takes to the stage. This is also a defining moment of the show's entertainment factor. Now, Jake is an established cabaret and burlesque performer. In fact, they were the first non binary performer to perform at the iconic venue Crazy Horse. And they play a non binary character in the show who is initially introduced to us as Trey and later announces that they are now going by the name of Chardonnay. And there's a little bit of friction with Tess about the outfits that they want to wear and the dressing room that they want to use, which gets resolved calmly enough. And it's not particularly robust queer representation, if we're being honest. It's about as substantial as the character of Baby Doll in Moulin Rouge, I'd say it's almost exactly the same. But what we do get is this glorious burlesque solo from Jake in the second act, which is acrobatic and has striptease elements. But it incites the audience to such a thrilling degree because it has this winking, knowing quality of conversation with the audience that the rest of the burlesque numbers don't. They are, you know, explosive, and there is flipping choreography and the costumes are gorgeous and the vocals are great, but it is just musical theatre. It doesn't feel like burlesque. This moment feels like burlesque. And it's a little surprised that it's from an established burlesque performer, but little details, I think would go a long way in terms of. Of changing this. And, you know, we don't get a lot of. And I know that burlesque is bigger than just striptease, but we get really very little removing of any articles of clothing. There's one number that toys with this at the very beginning, but it's just like one reveal and then it doesn't go particularly much further. There are characters of twins who do a number with a martini glass. And there is, of course, the iconic Dita Von Teese routine, which has been repeated by many other performers, in which the performer is in a giant cocktail glass and they have a giant cocktail glass behind them, but they just sing about martinis and they don't at any point get into or out of the glass. And at that point, if they're not going to use the glass, then it just feels like an unrealistically large and expensive prop for them to have backstage and wheel out on stage just so they can stand in front of it. I don't know that the audience at the burlesque club club really gain much from just seeing a big cocktail glass behind them as they sing suggestively about being a martini. It is just now occurring to me that this was meant to be the section of the review in which I defend the show's strengths. And, you know, I. I can only say it so many times. It is hugely entertaining when they deliver these numbers, and it creates an organic standing ovation. You want to stand at the end of the. Because particularly the final number is so explosive. It is so talent filled and the dance is fantastic. The cast are extraordinarily talented. It all looks stylish enough. I like the set design from Nate Bertone, who I think is a really fantastic set designer and who has done very interesting things with the proscenium here. And these sort of opera boxes that move in and out and there is a scree in the background and there are some set pieces that come up and down. It's not the world's most complicated set, but it does. Does sort of as much as it needs to. And these costumes from Marco Marco. I know tonight may have been the first time that some of these costumes were actually seen by a paying audience, and there's been something of a hoopla to have them ready in time, but I thought the costumes were all really great. I would like for there to have been more of a sense of evolution from the first act to the second. It would have been more interesting, especially in music as well, for there to be more distinction between the traditional world of burlesque that they were emulating setting and the updated version. I compared this to Sister act and Dolores coming in and changing the way that things were done. And for that to happen, you really need to feel the difference between the choir before and after Dolores. And I think it would be great for that to happen here as well. The trouble that you would have is if the before is this version, which is subject to criticism for being outdated and less compelling, then you're going to be boring your audience up until the point that it changes, which in this version of the show is the very end of Act 1:1. So you also understand the reluctance to do something like that. One other thing that I will say as I'm talking about the set design, is we have the title, the name of the show, Burlesque in Neon Lighting beforehand. We also have it projected multiple times on the back wall. If there's one thing that this production will offer you, and that you will really be able to leave the show with, it is an exact knowledge of how to spell burlesque. Like, if you had any kind of a flimsy grasp of this beforehand, you're really. You're really just going to have it in the bag by the time that you leave. Leave. And again, I do envision audiences walking away from this being really satisfied. I think for a lot of people, this is enough. I think it's going to be entertaining enough and charming enough and funny enough. And I think those real wow factor company moments can go a long way. I can't think of many other shows in the West End right now that are delivering that with the same kind of real force, other than something like Moulin Rouge, which is the obvious answer. But have our expectations been lowered by years of increasingly generic stage to screen musical adaptations? And ought we be asking for a little something more. To that end, here are some of the other issues which I have with Burlesque on stage.