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A CurtainUp 
London Review
London ReviewA Little Night Music
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She lightens my sadness,
She livens my days, She bursts with a kind of madness My well-ordered ways. My happiest mistake, the ache of my life. You must meet my wife. — Fredrik |
Alexander Hanson as Fredrik and Hannah Waddingham as Desirée
(Photo: Catherine Ashmore) |
What the intimacy of the production does is to ensure the clarity of every word of Sondheim's beautiful lyrics. No wonder he has such a cultured following. His skill with words is humbling and inspiring. Fortunately this is a musical with almost no choreography, just a waltz at the beginning so there is never the impression of being cramped. The waltz is there to show us the changing couples as the cast bring out the pain of so many disastrous marriages in Hugh Wheeler's book taken from the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night. There is a song by Sondheim which hasn't been included in a previous production. It's sung by Frid the manservant and called "Silly People" who sees the complications surrounding sex in the upper classes and thinks they are foolish, "crying in their teacups . . . don't know what they want."
Alexander Hanson plays Fredrik, the middle aged lawyer with a silvered beard, married to Anne who less than half his age will not allow him to consummate their eleven month old marriage. Anne is played by Jessie Buckley, the runner up on the reality television show to cast Nancy in Oliver! She is delightful, a good singer and has instinctive acting ability so Cameron Mackintosh and Andrew Lloyd Webber may well think the public have chosen the wrong girl. Of course we know that Fredrik, despite his protestations to the contrary, has probably made a bad choice of wife when he renews his dalliance with the lovely actress Desirée Armfeldt (Hannah Waddingham). Maureen Lipman is Madam Armfeldt, in a wheel chair but mentally alert, as sharp as a pin in fact, and responsible for bringing up her granddaughter Fredrika (Holly Hallam/Grace Link).
There is comedy as well as all this marital unhappiness. When Fredrick takes his new wife for a much wished for visit to the theatre, the tensions in the marriage result in their leaving before the end. When in the second act he introduces his wife to Desirée saying, "This is my wife" Desirée counters with "And this is my daughter," thus drawing a parallel between the relative age of Anne and Fredrika. Alistair Robins as the rather dim Count Carl-Magnus Malcolm is Desirée's dragoon lover and the butt of much of the comedy. The Countess Charlotte (Kelly Price), his wife, is a contemporary of Anne's and her song "Every Day A Little Death" is a bittersweet and heartfelt account of her love for her unfaithful husband, "I'm before him on my knees/And he kisses me/He assumes I'll lose my reason/And I do/Men are stupid/Men are vain/Love's disgusting/Love's insane/ A humiliating business."
The set is a series of doors with silvered glass pitted by time with odd items of period furniture, a bed, a chaise longue. The dresses are divine, cream creations in silk and damask and lace with fine corsets and bustles as are the women's wigs. The characterisations are finely judged as Trevor Nunn shows his expertise in this lovely show. When word gets out, A Little Night Music will undoubtedly sell out. In a first for this theatre, the seats are now numbered and pre-allocated. The only issue will be where can it transfer to and retain this intimacy?
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A Little Night Music
Music by Stephen Sondheim Book: Hugh Wheeler Based on the film by Ingmar Bergman Directed by Trevor Nunn Starring: Alistair Hanson, Hannah Waddingham, Maureen Lipman With: Gabriel Vick, Lynden Edwards, Charlotte Page, Laura Armstrong, John Addison, Nicola Sloane, Holly Hallam/Grace Link, Jeremy Finchy, Jessie Buckley, Kaisa Hammarlund, Alistair Robins, Kelly Price Set and Costume Design: David Farley Choreographer: Lynne Page Orchestrations: Jason Carr Musical Supervision: Caroline Humphris Lighting: Hartley T A Kemp Sound: Gareth Owen for Orbital Originally produced on Broadway by Harold Prince Running time: Three hours with one interval Box Office: 020 7907 7060 Booking to 8th March 2009 Reviewed by Lizzie Loveridge based on 6th December 2008 at the Menier Chocolate Factory, Southwark Street, London SE1 (Rail/Tube: London Bridge) |
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Musical Numbers
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Act One
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Act Two
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