THIS new musical production of one of the world’s most popular stories, with seven new numbers by George Stiles and Anthony Drewe happily blending with the Sherman Brothers iconic original score, is big, bold and beautiful.
It has lavish sets with costumes to match, by Bob Crowley, that change with the precision of co-director Matthew Bourne’s wonderfully imaginatively choreographed, dance routines that had the audience whooping with delight, Hugh Vanstone’s beautifully created lighting effects, a perfectly delivered sound design and a 12-piece orchestra under Isaac McCullough’s direction that delivered the numbers in an always supportive, never overpowering manner for the vocalists.
Visually a treat, it then produced under the guidance of co-director Richard Eyre, performances to match or even exceed these terrific pictures. At its head were two Australian imports – Stefanie Jones, a Mary Poppins straight out of the pages of P L Travers books, and Walt Disney’s 13-times Academy Award nominated film, and Jack Chalmers as Bert, a song and dance man par excellence.
Cheered to the rafters as she made her final flying exit high above the audience’s heads, Stefanie had already won their hearts with her beautifully stylised Mary Poppins and with Jack Chambers leading an outstanding full quota company, no skimping on numbers in this lavish production, in the show-stopping numbers Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, and the equally stunning Step in Time. Early in the show she musically describes herself as Practically Perfect, and as far as the audience were concerned it was a fair description of her portrait of the title character.
As any good actor playing a leading role will tell you, it always helps your performance to have top class people around you and Stefanie and Jack certainly had that asset. Taking full advantage of some of the new numbers put at their disposal to add a little extra, Michael D Xavier and Lucie Mae Sumner brought humour and poignancy to their portraits of George and Mrs Banks. Florence Swann and Charlie Donald, two of the ten youngsters sharing roles of the Banks children Jane and Michael, had the audience eating out of their hands from their first entrance, constantly threatening to steal the scene from the adults. Rosemary Ashe and Ruairidh McDonald humorously completed the Banks household, competing well with Wendy Ferguson’s ferocious old nanny Miss Andrews, when she attempts to usurp Mary Poppins’ position.
Outside the Banks home was a string of well-drawn characters played by a cast of dancing, singing actors with genuine talent. Patti Boulaye as the old Bird Lady, Sharon Wattis, candy shop owner Mrs Corry, given just a little window in which to show off their vocal abilities. David Burrows doubling up as Admiral Boom and the Chairman of the Bank, produces two well crafted characters, as does Rachael Ward as Miss Lark and James Wolstenholme as the Park Keeper. You’ll go a long way to find any moth holes in the fabric of the supporting players in this company.
And the same goes for the ensemble, whose singing and dancing was exciting. They will be hard-pressed to maintain that high level of energetic exuberance and commitment throughout the entire run, and are such a delight to watch and listen to.
The feelings of the audience can be best summed up by a remark heard several times on the way out of the theatre ‘ I wanted more … I didn’t want it to end’. This Disney and Cameron Mackintosh show ends its run at the Bristol Hippodrome on Saturday 30th November.
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