Nikolai Foster sprinkles some directorial magic over an important tackle My Fair Lady on the Curve, Leicester
“Does enchantment pourOut of every door?”
I remarked the final time I noticed My Fair Lady that we don’t get to see it that always, given its standing as a stalwart of the traditional musical theatre style. I wasn’t a lot of a fan of that 2022 manufacturing on the Coliseum (which went on to tour the UK) however I did benefit from the one earlier than for me which was Sheffield’s 2012 manufacturing. News that it could be 2024’s Made at Curve Christmas manufacturing made me hope that journeying out of London as soon as once more could be simply the trick.
I’d argue that it completely is. Director Nikolai Foster sprinkles simply sufficient freshness over Lerner and Loewe’s musical to make it shine anew, sufficient refined variations that accumulate to an general substantive new method which, for me, actually works in a approach that the Lincoln Center manufacturing’s adjustments didn’t fairly obtain. A youthful Professor Higgins right here, an explicitly homosexual Colonel Pickering there, the resetting of the core relationships ends in one thing actually fairly joyous.
At the guts of the present, Molly Lynch’s Eliza does an exceptional job with Loewe’s rating, her shimmering soprano taking classics resembling ‘Wouldn’t It Be Loverly’ and ‘I Could Have Danced All Night’ and delivering them with wonderful talent. Her lyrical expertise, notably round her growing accent are technically very good too. David Seadon-Young makes for a youthful Professor than we would beforehand have seen however he makes it make excellent sense, his almost-manic manner suggesting perhaps he’s someplace on the spectrum however not definitively so, the main target extra on the nice and cozy comedy coming from his pairing with Minal Patel’s hopelessly flirtatious Pickering.
Michael Taylor’s set and costume design is a triumph, extending out into the auditorium of the Curve in methods I haven’t seen earlier than (although tbh I don’t go to as typically as I would really like…) and terribly fluid in the way in which it switches places. Joanna Goodwin’s choreography likewise makes use of the house properly and the harmonies of the corporate sound unbelievable underneath George Dyer’s musical supervision. Cathy Tyson’s Mrs Higgins, Damian Buhagiar’s Zoltan, Steve Furst’s Alfred, so most of the supporting performances register so strongly too, like an creation calendar giving its a number of items.