We went to see the revival of an old classic at the Open Air Theatre last night, and it was a great evening.
Hello Dolly! is an odd show, based on an odd story by Thornton Wilder about a scheming match-maker and her influence on the sensibilities of small-town America. Indeed, I never got on with the glossy MegaBabs screen version (possibly because of my aversion to Michael Crawford). However, this production was superb!
In the beautifully atmospheric surroundings of Regent's Park (with no rain, again, so our picnic wasn't washed out), the set is wonderfully old-fashioned and conveys both the fustiness of (unmarried "half-millionaire") Horace Vandergelder's hay and feed emporium and the glamorous New York settings in which the wide-eyed characters find themselves.
Remarkably, the show's lesser-known songs come across better in this production than I remember in the film - It Takes A Woman, Put On Your Sunday Clothes (complete with a choreographed evocation of a train journey) and Before The Parade Passes By were all brilliantly done!
In the second half the schemes that Dolly Levi has put into place, both for herself and for others, begin to come to fruition in a hilarious melange. Possibly the best scene in the whole show is the superbly performed Waiters' Galop in the restaurant, with acrobatic waiters dancing attendance, the out-of-town boys trying desperately to work out how to pay for the extravagant meal to which they have brought their dates (widowed hat-maker Irene and her assistant Minnie) on one side of the stage, and the thoroughly embarrassed Mr Vandergelder attempting to calm his own dinner companion (Ernestina Money) down as she tries to dance the hootchie-cootchie on the other...
Of course this unsuitable dinner guest is all Dolly's work as she wants Horace all to herself, and this is more or less sealed when she arrives at the restaurant, accompanied by the show's triumphal Hello Dolly! number. Chaos takes over as all the guests - including Vandergelder's wayward niece - come into contact with each other, there is a mix-up over paying the bills, and somehow everyone ends up in court.
Inevitably, this being a Jerry Herman musical, everything is resolved in the end. All the star-crossed lovers overcome their problems, and even grumpy old Horace Vandergelder relents and proposes to Dolly. All in all, a superb feel-good show (which is all you can ask for really).
Samantha Spiro was an exuberant Dolly Levi, Allan Corduner a convincingly miserable old sod as Horace, and Josefina Gabrielle was great as the elegant Irene, but it's the superb choreography that really makes the show. Not so surprising when you realise that this is the work of the award-winning Stephen Mear (who also did Crazy For You, Oklahoma, Acorn Antiques The Musical and Mary Poppins among many others in the West End and on Broadway). I highly recommend this show!
Open Air Theatre website
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