It only gets better and stronger

Madam Arcati, Russ, Joe and I got tickets last night to see the critically acclaimed new production of Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, that recently transferred from the world-beating Menier Chocolate Factory to the Harold Pinter Theatre off Leicester Square. Not knowing a hell of a lot about the show, we were stunned by its brilliance.

Directed (her first time) by the utterly marvellous Maria Friedman, whose own theatrical success owes much indeed to Mr Sondheim (she has appeared in Passion, Merrily, Sunday in the Park with George and A Little Night Music, and we saw her back in 2007 as ‘Mrs Lovett’ to Bryn Terfel’s Sweeney Todd) - the show’s own chequered history (it originally flopped at its premiere in 1981, and was re-written and re-designed many times before its current incarnation) could be safely laid to rest. Who better to make a success of a Sondheim musical than an avowed Sondheimite?

“Typically Sondheim” in its cleverness and complexity - based upon an original drama by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, the entire story of the lives of three friends (Franklin, Charley and Mary) travels backwards in time from its cripplingly brittle opening scenes featuring the breakdown of relationships (and personalities), to the naïve enthusiastic energy of the protagonists’ teenage years in the show’s denouement - nevertheless the quality of the acting, the singing, the dancing, the comic turns (some of the ensemble players - in particular the various parts played by Martin Callaghan - and the rip-roaring revue number Bobby and Jackie and Jack) the sets, the orchestration (and the score itself, of course) brings Merrily’s engaging story to life, but with an unexpectedly emotional punch. Everything about this musical is top notch, not least the excellent cast.



Portraying the “anti-hero” Franklin, (the rather attractive) Mark Umbers gleefully exudes all the charm and ruthlessness that got him to the top in his ultimately superficial career ["Look at me, I'm rich and happy!/ Days go zipping,/ Sitting by the pool and tripping" - sardonically sung as his “friends” slag him off], yet in the latter (more youthful) scenes he captures the innocence, bravado and insecurity that were the foundations of his eventually unhappy path ["We're opening doors, singing, 'Here we are!' We're filling up days on a dime."].

Jenna Russell is excellent as Mary, whose sometimes comic (especially in her opening number Now You Know), and sometimes tragically desperate persona simultaneously provides the “glue” to keep the “old friends” together, and inadvertently exposes their differences [“I want it the way that it was./ Help me stop remembering then.”].

Steadfast Charley (played with aplomb by Damian Humbley) is the first of the three to settle down, first to have (lots of) children, and appears to be the “calm head” of the Old Friends ["But us, old friend/ What's to discuss, old friend?/ Here's to us - who's like us?/ Damn few!"] - yet it is he who is first to decry Franklin’s ambitiousness, and it is he who (hilariously yet disastrously) becomes the one who (publicly, on TV, in his uproarious “patter song” Franklin Shepard, Inc.) destroys the bonds that held the friendships together.

Their eventual unhappiness - used almost, but not quite, as a warning against ambition - is indeed a looming theme of the story. The question being asked throughout, however, is in the lyrics of the show's title song - “how did you get to be here?”- and it is a question that raises all sorts of contrary interpretations. Is Franklin really the ultimate bastard, or was he the one that was used and abused and held back by others? Is Mary really hard-done-by and deserted, or has she wasted her own potential on fruitless longing for the past and “what could have been”? Is Charley the victim of Franklin’s vainglorious aspirations, or is he the selfish one, unwilling to change and try new things?

The true drama of the whole thing is not necessarily the self-centred and misguided hopes and dreams of the three lead characters, but how they affect the lives of others that are dragged into their wake.



True, the theatrical vixen Gussie Carnegie (wonderfully played by Josephina Gabrielle) - who watches Franklin for years from the side-lines, biding her time until she snares him away from his wife - is an icy bitch (who gets her moment in the spotlight in Charley and Frank’s Musical Husbands number, complete with fairy-light-illuminated fans(!), but whose comeuppance is waiting in the form of “the younger woman” who catches Franklin's eye). But it is the husband she destroys in the process, Joe (Glyn Kerslake), who provides a layer of pathos in her story as we travel back and discover just how much every character owes him for their success.

The most powerfully moving experience in the whole show, however, is the story of the romance and marriage of Franklyn and Beth (played beautifully by Clare Foster). Travelling backwards, of course, we get the bitter and hurtful divorce (with Gussie cited as co-respondent) before the wedding, and we first encounter Beth practically spitting the lyrics of the show’s definitive torch song Not A Day Goes By at the errant Frank outside the divorce court. Only in the later scene, in the full flush of love at their wedding, does the full effect of the song (reprised) become tragically clear. I must admit, I cried.

This is an outstanding show for all the right reasons. Sadly, somehow I sense it will fly over the heads of many of the ignoramuses (ignoramii?) who make up the bulk of West End audiences these days. It is their loss, and our gain.

Here’s the fantastic Bernadette Peters with her tear-jerking rendition of Not A Day Goes By:

Bernadette Peters - Not a Day Goes By

Not a day goes by
Not a single day
But you're somewhere a part of my life
And it looks like you'll stay.

As the days go by
I keep thinking when does it end

Where's the day I'll have started forgetting
But I just go on thinking and sweating
And cursing and crying
And turning and reaching
And waking and dying

And no, not a day goes by
Not a blessed day
But you're still somehow part of my life
And you won't go away
So there's hell to pay

And until I die
I'll die day after day after day
After day
After day after day after day
Til the days go by
Til the days go by
Til the days go by

And the "optimistic" version, at the wedding:

Not a day goes by
Not a single day
But you're somewhere a part of my life,
And it looks like you'll stay.

As the days go by,
I keep thinking, "When does it end?"

That it can't get much better much longer.
But it only gets better and stronger
And deeper and nearer
And simpler and freer
And richer and clearer

And no,
Not a day goes by,
Not a blessed day
But you somewhere come into my life
And you don't go away.

And I have to say
If you do, I'll die.

I want day after day
After day after day
After day after day
After day after day
After day

Till the days go by,
Till the days go by,
Till the days go by!

And here is the trailer for the show itself:

Merrily We Roll Along theatrical trailer

Book your tickets for Merrily We Roll Along today!