UK Critics Get a Look at Sinatra at the London Palladium
by Theatre.com Staff • Mar 10, 2006
Sinatra at the London Palladium, a revised version of the Radio City Music Hall show Sinatra: His Voice. His World. His Way…, openedin the West End on March 8. Archive footage of Sinatra himself performing is projected onto screens that float above and behind a stage populated by a 20-strong dance troupe choreographed by Stephen Mear, and an onstage band under the supervision of Gareth Valentine, in a production directed by David Leveaux. Did critics welcome Ol' Blue Eyes back?
Here's a sampling of what they had to say:
Here's a sampling of what they had to say:
Mark Shenton in his Theatre.com Review: "The unique success of this particular jukebox, however, is not just that it's loaded up with some fantastic songs, but that it also plays them at once authentically--voiced by Sinatra himself, rather than in pale cover versions--and also adds something immediate and live for today.The show distills the songs through an eye-poppingly lavish multimedia experience that contributes interpretative layers and textures of its own that make you see and hear these mostly familiar, classic songs in a new choreographic and musical light. In the process, it may be stealing a march on Movin' Out Twyla Tharp's narrative ballet set to the songs of Billy Joel, which will arrive in the West End from Broadway later this month, but like that brilliant contemporary exploration of a pre-existing repertoire in a new context, this too flirts and teases new ideas out of performances that might have been thought to have been locked down forever by the posterity of the video archive they come from."
Clive Davis of the The London Times: "Unfortunately, this production by David Leveaux remains stubbornly two-dimensional. A scene midway through the first half sums up the problems. As a gaggle of cute Forties bobbysoxers skip around with milkshakes in their hands to the strains of 'Oh, Look at Me Now' you realise, with a sinking heart, that this show has vanilla, not bourbon, running through its veins. There are moments, to be sure, when the visuals and the music hang together. 'One For My Baby and One More for the Road', for instance, cleverly smuggles one of the blonde dancers into the moody, black and white footage of Sinatra drowning his sorrows. Sometimes there is a genuine glimpse of what could be a new form of stage entertainment."
Michael Billington of The Guardian: "What kind of show is it?, a passing actor asked as I hurtled out of the Palladium. Not an easy question to answer. Seen in an earlier version at Radio City Music Hall, this weird extravaganza creates a new category: what you might call glitzy necrophilia, that uses all the resources of technology to summon up the dead…. The real problem with the show is that there is too much competing visual information and sometimes a bathetic tastelessness. It seems particularly gruesome to accompany iconic shots of the JFK motorcade in Dallas with Sinatra singing 'Send in the Clowns'. Did no one listen to lyrics which contain the lines 'me on the ground, you in mid-air?'"
Charles Spencer of The Daily Telegraph: "We go to the theatre to watch performers live--not a necrophiliac tribute embalmed in celluloid. So here is a tip to save yourself some cash. Settle down in an armchair. Pour yourself a bourbon and light a cigarette if you are still allowed such things. Hit the remote control so that Songs for Swingin' Lovers starts playing at a decent volume and wave a picture of Frank Sinatra in front of your eyes. You will be having a better time than you would at the London Palladium."
Paul Taylor of The Independent: "Frank Sinatra staged so many comebacks during his long career that it would clearly take more than death to prevent him from making yet another positively last appearance. Fifty-six years since he first played this venue and eight years since his demise, Ol' Blue Eyes is back, though in virtual form only - which gives a somewhat spooky twist to the idea of returning to an old haunt. There is something decidedly rum about a theatrical event where everything - the 24-piece orchestra, a 20-strong dancing troupe - is live apart from the star."
Nick Curtis of The Evening Standard: "This is not as satisfying a live experience as a real concert or even a tribute act, not as informative as a documentary, not as cheap and easy as listening to the CD of Songs for Swingin' Lovers. Which is a shame, because £5 million and a great deal of creative effort have been spent to bring this show to its weird half-life."
Sheridan Morley of The Daily Express: "A lifesize aeroplane wing is flown in for 'Fly Me to the Moon' and, to take our minds off the fact that the central attraction is essentially a load of old performance clips, there's an all-singing, all-dancing chorus of 20 plus an on-stage orchestra of 30 led by a dancing conductor. Nobody gets to rest in this show, least of all when Frank is on screen, which is effectively all the time. Sometimes the show seems unable to decide what it is: a celebration concert, a critical documentary or a starstruck biography. Playing safe, the production goes for all three."
Quentin Letts of The Daily Mail: "'Bona Fide 100 per cent Frank!' screams a sign outside the Palladium. 'Ol' Blue Eyes is Back!' I hope the producers are investigated by the local Plods under the Sales Description Act, for obviously Ol' Blue Eyes is not back at all, being six foot under. It might have been more honest if they'd stuck up a sign saying 'posthumous karoake' or 'old footage tweaked on computers and served up warm. And yet the evening is not without some value. The music is familiar and some of the dancing girls are ably leggy. The only trouble is that you keep wanting to watch Sinatra's quirky, expressive face on the big screens. Lots of the live performance goes ignored."