Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Will Young, Siobhan Dillon, Lyn Paul, Matt Rawle, Linal Haft, Valerie Cutko, Nicholas Tizzard, Carly Blackburn, Emily Bull, Luke Fetherston, Simon Jaymes, Alessia Lugoboni, Callum Macdonald, Alastair Postlethwaite, Oliver Roll, Alexzandra Sarmiento, Shahla Tarrant, Cydney Uffindell-Phillips.
There are musicals that grace the stage with such spellbinding brilliance that the glitter and sheen never seems to rub off, never falters and certainly never lets the audience come away feeling anything other than wanting to dance all the way home and sing their favourite song with gladness in their heart. Then there are those that are so astonishing because they have made the crowd question everything they know about humanity and the darkness in people’s hearts and in a nation’s deeds. Perhaps it can be argued that only Cabaret manages to do both at the same time.
Set during the bitter sweet final days of the great jazz and scintillating and wonderfully decadent days of revue bars and the feeling of living life to the maximum and the horrific dark days that blighted Germany and allowed madness and insanity free reign, Cabaret had all the elements of being in the right place at the right time as the country entered the 74th anniversary of the start of dreadful days.
From the outstanding almost ghoulish start as the audience were welcomed in to the world of Sally Bowles, the spectre of Nazism was never too far away, as the dancers went from outrageously inspired routines to the military order that was starting to creep into the streets of Berlin.
In a musical that deals with the idea of decadence and so called depravity as its core theme, the final scenes frame the dark heart that was at the very core of Germany in the 1930s and 40s, the seeping festering wound that sucked more and more people in and destroyed a nation. The music, which had begun to have serious disturbing undertones as the production went along, suddenly started to have the recognisable and disturbing aspects that people associate with at that time. The party was over, the fun and frolics of a scene and which made Berlin the ideal hedonistic and in many ways equal place was now under the rule of tyranny. As Siobhan Dillon made her way through perhaps the musical’s most prestigious number, there were some in the audience who audibly gasped as they realised what they were watching, the death of a nation and the start of end of the world for many.
Cabaret may be considered just a musical by many who dismiss these things with apparent ease but despite the great numbers, including So What?, Two Ladies, Tomorrow Belongs To Me and The excellent The Money Song, and the great performances, especially by Will Young, the marvellous Linal Haft and Lyn Paul, there is one fundamental question at the very essence of the production, just who is the more seemingly depraved, immoral and down-right degenerate? Most would gladly choose to spend the evening with Sally Bowles and Emcee any day. The cast captured this question perfectly and judging by the incredibly respectful applause at the end, as perhaps those that had never seen the production before were in just a small amount of shock, the cast did their job superbly. The near reverential and thoughtful applause soon gave way to a tremendous standing ovation and justly deserved it was too.
Cabaret is the musical with a song in its heart but a very wicked sting in its tail, a sumptuous must see.
Ian D. Hall