Lace up your corset and stick on your lashes

Burlesque has shimmied into town...

The company of Burlesque the Musical. Photo: Pamela Raith

This is a two martini show if ever I saw one.

What I’ve seen

In fact, in my case, Burlesque the Musical, which opened at the Savoy Theatre this week after a very troubled preview period that saw the departure of its original director, choreographer and design team and a report that Equity was “supporting the cast” over issues with working hours and conditions, was a two martini, one double vodka tonic show. But the result of that is that my friend and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

In case you have no idea what I’m on about, it’s based on the rather convoluted 2010 film about a young aspiring singer Ali (Christina Aguilera, in the film), who basically turns around the fortunes of an ailing burlesque club owned by Tess (played by Cher). There’s a love story in it too, obviously.

Aguilera (who appeared at the curtain call, tiny and a bit pinched) is a producer on the musical, which has been reworked from the original story to one where there is a single important plot point (Tess is Ali’s birth mother, a bombshell that lands a couple of minutes into the show, and which she takes remarkably cheerfully, considering her adoptive mother, who kept it a secret, has recently died).

There is, on the face of it, a lot wrong with this show – it’s far too long, there are entirely too many pointless numbers that add nothing to the already flimsy story, and the finale isn’t very good.

But they’ve done exactly the right thing with the very PG film, which is to make the whole thing very knowing and nod-and-a-winky, leaning in to the idea of a burlesque club to give it a kind of cabaret vibe – cabaret with a small c, not with added Nazis.

The script is genuinely funny without being especially clever, and even though very little happens, it has a cheerful headlong energy that is very easy to ride if you relax into it and as we’ve established, I was very relaxed.

I also think that the cast is mostly great – the two young leads, Jess Folley as Ali and Paul Jacob French as Jackson (I think he’s a bartender, maybe also a dancer, hard to tell, not sure it matters), have a convincing sexy chemistry – you get the sense they’re really enjoying each other and they’re both totally relaxed onstage in a way that isn’t always the case in musical theatre, especially when it’s a real belter.

Todrick Hall, who plays both Sean (Tess’s right hand man) and Ali’s hometown choirmistress Miss Loretta – which is a genius comic twist I think and sets the camp tone right from the start – is actually really lovely. His scenes with Orfeh (who is an American singer I had never heard of, but I’m reliably informed she’s a big musical theatre cheese in the US) as Tess, elevate her slightly park-and-park performance I think – and all of them have incredible voices.

But let’s talk about Todrick Hall – as well as playing two of the characters, he’s also now director and choreographer. I realise this show was pretty troubled throughout its preview period and probably before, but when you hear that somebody’s taken over this role, that role and they’re also in it, you do think it’s going to be a car crash. But by some enormous feat of something, it isn’t.

Except for the fact that it has an insane 30 numbers, which is basically unacceptable. At least eight of them could be removed without any problem and a good solid trim would be no bad thing – it’s two hours 45, which isn’t the worst, but it is a too long for such an incredibly slight story.

It might have something to do with the fact that Hall has written nearly all of the extra material (there are a few by Aguilera, from the original film, and Sia). I think you can tell by the fact that they are mostly incredibly short (a couple of minutes at most) that he has been trimming and trimming to get it down from the crazy three hours ten minutes that it was just a few days before press night. Kill your darlings, Todders, it’s the only way to do it with dignity.

I do want to mention one song, Got it All From You, which is an early number that eagle-eyed programme readers will notice is written by Folley. I was impressed – it’s one of the clearest and best in that it most effectively does the job that musical theatre songs are supposed to do: propel the story, give insight into someone’s inner life at a moment of heightened emotion, and give an indication of why they’re about to do what they’re going to do.