REVIEW: FORBIDDEN BROADWAY, Menier Chocolate Factory, 3rd July 2009

Yesterday, after a day of listening to the new Chess In Concert recording, I spent the day with my Facebook status set to "wonders why Idina Menzel has to SHOUT at her ALL THE TIME".

To go to a show the following day where the idol of the fangirls is mercilessly sent up for her volume and her vamping seemed serendipitous.

Not averse to a touch of affectionate mockery when it comes to musical theatre, I was looking forward FORBIDDEN BROADWAY, back for a run at the Menier until September. The cast are engaging and highly talented - Anna-Jane Casey (cheerfully self-parodying in opening number All That Chat), Sophie-Louise Dann, Steven Kynman and Christopher Ragland (understudy for Alasdair Harvey, missing the show on press night to be with his wife while she gave birth to their first child, earning a big "aww" from the audience when announced prior to the curtain).

I couldn't stop laughing at the much-fabled Les Miserables section, with the cast shuffling round in a circle to imitate the notorious revolving turntable; and the ribbing of Cameron Mackintosh for his unfailing eye for a commercial opening was nicely done. Kudos to the Menier for allowing the writers to tear into their productions of La Cage Aux Folles (providing a lovely closing singalong number) and A Little Night Music (and its statuesque star, Hannah Waddingham).

And yet the entirety of the show was slightly disappointing. Sometimes it was simply the gags falling flat - the Hairspray send-up was funny when teasing leading lady Michael Ball, but not so amusing when relying on the title line, You Can't Stop The Camp, for the laughs, and the verse about SheriDan Smith starring in Legally Blonde might work better had the show opened. 

Sometimes it was the incessant repetition of a joke that wasn't that funny in the first place - call me over-sensitive but I felt uncomfortable with the Billy Elliot sketch and its references to Elton John and Stephen Daldry's relationship with the young cast.

Sometimes it was the incessant repetition of a serious message - the over-Disneyification of musical theatre and the concomitant high cost of tickets were stressed over and over and over again. Even when one shares the concern it's difficult to laugh at fundamentally the same gag for the fourth or fifth time.

And sometimes it was just that the audience didn't seem that familiar with the source material. Totally Bleeped, sending up Spring Awakening, engendered laughter in four people and utter bewilderment in the rest of the Menier benches. An homage to Equus in the form of a Harry Potter striptease to the strains of an adulterated Let Me Entertain You (from Gypsy) also seemed to cause confusion and uncomfortable laughter. Surprisingly the Wicked sketch fell a little flat too - perhaps this slightly older theatre-going crowd couldn't get to the Apollo Victoria box office for all the teenage girls in the way while Menzel was running there.

Nevertheless, it's worth a look - and I shall definitely check back later in the run to see if the script's been tweaked at all as the creatives get to grips with the rest of London's Theatreland.

Rating: * * * * (for the cast performances); * * (for their material)

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