BWW Reviews: RUMPY PUMPY, Landor Theatre, April 14 2015

What happens when separate worlds collide? How do you do the right thing when there is no "right thing"? Should behaviour of which one disapproves be stopped or managed?

There's a lot of those kinds of questions in Rumpy Pumpy (at the Landor Theatre until 19 April) most obviously when Jean Johnson (Valerie Cutko) and Shirley Landels (Marjorie Keys) of the Hampshire Women's Institute drop in on The Blue Saloon, a brothel run by tart-with-a-heart Holly Spencer (a very loud Mandi Symonds). The good ladies of the WI's motive, unlike the male pillars of the establishment who are availing themselves of the services provided or the zealous police harassing Holly, concerns the welfare of the women who work there - the working girls whose outside worlds are university, homemaking, even the police force. Based on a true story, Barbara Jane Mackie's musical shines a light on a dark corner of British life and asks if it really has to be that way.

It's an important and neglected question for debate - but is it good drama? Well, the songs are excellent: catchy, witty and played with real verve by Steve Parker at the piano. The singing is somewhat variable, but Joanne Sandi has a delightful voice and considerable range and Valerie Cutko has lost none of her power to milk a ballad for all its worth.

So that's the most crucial element of the job description delivered by Mackie, who is responsible for the book, music and lyrics in her first musical - unfortunately, there's much to do elsewhere. On opening night, the cast were hesitant, under-rehearsed and lacking the level of commitment I have become used to on the London fringe. No doubt they will come round with time, but I was left wondering (and not for the first time) whether the Press might be better invited a day or two into a run, even a short one. Director Thom Sellwood will be able to take some of the stiffness out of the performances and allow the other actors to enjoy some of Scarlett Courtney's relaxed approach, splendid as Trish, working for her child back in Ireland. By the time you read this, I'm sure the production will be transformed.

Straplining the show "The Female Full Monty" is overselling its merits, but Rumpy Pumpy, especially if the overly long Act Two was tightened and the panto finale ditched, has the potential to be an amusing comedy with some very strong songs, underpinned by a tough message about how hypocrisy and indifference condemns thousands of girls to appalling working conditions. The Hampshire WI may never find the perfect brothel, but there's room for a great deal of improvement behind the net curtains of a house or two in a street near where you live. I wish them well.

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