Reviewed by Louise Watts
On a very rainy evening in Brighton, what could be better than a trip to the theatre to see an upbeat musical masterpiece with an outstanding cast? The answer – absolutely nothing.
Yesterday evening (29 May 2018), I was lucky enough to be able to go to the opening night of Crazy for You at the Theatre Royal starring Tom Chambers, Claire Sweeney and Charlotte Wakefield. Crazy for You was written by George and Ira Gershwin in the 1930’s under the slightly different name of “Girl Crazy” and opened on Broadway in 1930. Fast forward 60 years and it was revamped by Ken Ludwig and Mike Ockrent and relaunched on Broadway in 1992 and in the West End in 1993 as “Crazy for You”.
Crazy for You tells the story of a romance between New York City wannabe dancer Bobby Child played by the wonderful Tom Chambers. Tom is best known to me as Sam Strachan in Holby City but has a string of television and theatre credits to his name. He also won Strictly Come Dancing in 2008 and having seen his performance last night, I not at all surprised! He falls in love with Polly Baker (Charlotte Wakefield) whilst in Nevada on a business trip arranged by his mother. To add complication, he has a fiancée at home in New York called Irene. Irene is played by the extremely talented and very popular Claire Sweeney.
This show has everything – comedy, a fantastic score, musicians performing on stage as part of the cast and an extraordinary amount of sheer talent.
Tom and Charlotte were phenomenal. The effort and energy that they put into their performance was out of this world and quite frankly I am surprised that Tom was still standing at the end. He was on stage for the majority of the show and his dance routines were incredible. I have always thought he is gorgeous but now, having seen him tap dance as well I am simply in awe of this incredibly talented man. In order to keep up with him he needed an equally impressive leading lady and he certainly had that. Charlotte also put in an incredible performance and I love seeing the added dimension of some tap dance routines as it shows the actors performing on another level which just increases my respect and appreciation of them.
Claire Sweeney was very impressive as Irene Roth, Bobby’s fiancée who chases him to Nevada only to find he has fallen in love with Polly. She then ends up finding the man of her dreams – a very unlikely pair but you could feel the tension rising on stage between Irene and her man Lank (played by Christopher Fry) and the outcome was inevitable! They were a well matched double act and their performance of “Naughty Baby” was brilliant. I would like to have seen more of Claire, for such a big-name star, she actually had a relatively small part which was in my opinion a shame as I feel she had so much more to give.
The on-stage swing and remainder of the cast were all outstanding and the fact that they were all musicians too was delightful to watch – the level of talent on stage was unmeasurable. I am not sure I have ever seen so much talent in one cast before. I wish I could mention them all but sadly that is not possible. There was a minor change of cast in the second half but this was managed very well and to be honest it had no impact on the show itself.
I must mention two other actors though who were fantastic – the award for the best facial expressions has to go to Stacey Ghent in her role as Patricia Fodor and her right-hand man Kieran Kuypers in his role as her husband Eugene. They were absolutely hilarious and had me in stitches.
The set was perfect, the costumes were very fitting with the time and location of the story and the props were used well.
It was lovely to see the theatre packed out with people on this rainy night and the staff at the Theatre Royal were helpful and polite as always. Parking was easy in the multi-storey car park a short walk from the theatre and at £6 for the evening I thought that was very reasonable for a city centre car park.
I would thoroughly recommend this show to everybody who loves a good musical with 1930’s character. I am sure you will not be disappointed. The cast are incredible, and the story has so much to it you will never have the chance to be bored. A musical theatre masterpiece with an amazing level of talent! Phenomenal!!
Rating: 5/5
Tickets cost from £17.90 to £68.90 (plus £2.85 transaction fee).
Crazy For You is at the Theatre Royal in Brighton from 29 May to 2 June 2018, for more information or to book tickets visit www.atgtickets.com/brighton or call the box office on 0844 871 7650.
Theatre Royal. New Road, Brighton, East Sussex, BN1 1SD | 0844 871 7650
