Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Nadia Anim, Emma Bispham, Richard Bremmer, Patrick Brennan, George Caple, Paul Duckworth, Marc Elliott, Cerith Flinn, Emily Hughes, Nathan McMullen, Zelina Rebeiro, George Rosheuvel, Keddy Sutton, Liam Tobin.

Band: George Francis, Rosalind Jones, Katie Foster, Matthew Henry, Alex Smith, Nick Anderson.

It was the era of exploration, and arguably, exploitation, of the days following the annexation of California in the United States of America’s war against Mexico, of hardship and big rewards and one to which the romantic heart may dream of as being a settling of wits between the Earth and man’s desire; the thoughts of the Gold Rush has been passed down as one in which perhaps defines the American soul, adventure, hard toil, misuse of the land and the people who came to mine in it and hedonism, a tale of pleasure seeking and abandon.

For the Everyman Company, 2017 was a big year, it was one that saw the realisation of a dream of their own and one that was incredibly well received and rightly so; 2018 has already seen the flag and staked claim raised higher as the Company took to the hills and made sure that this year’s opening salvo of Paint Your Wagon reached into the rich vein of musical passion and surpassed any expectations projected and prospected by the Liverpool theatre audiences.

It would have been a tough call to choose a play that could even match the intensity and passion of last year’s opening production of Fiddler on the Roof, a play that would encompass the entire company and see the dream, the reality, continue. In Lerner and Loewe’s Paint Your Wagon, that play doesn’t just materialise, it shouts down from the highest possible vantage point, “That there is gold on that there stage”.

A production that has everything and lacks for nothing, one that would have the artistic nature in anyone frothing and simmering wonderfully, impossible to not enjoy, its choreography, supervised by Tom Jackson Greaves, is sublime, the musical numbers incredibly well captured by both band and actor alike and one that comes with a demanding and beautifully realised lighting by Kay Haynes. It is a play that can only have been brought together by the Everyman team and one that deserves the fullest of appreciation and respect.

A Company is the complete sum of its parts, it is not just one person, it cannot be a singular effort but with Gemma Bodinetz directing and with Company newcomers such as Nathan McMullen and Liverpool’s own Paul Duckworth joining forces with the sublime likes of Keddy Sutton, Patrick Brennan, Emily Hughes and George Caple, Paint Your Wagon is a production that you should up-sticks for, search for your own wandering star and follow it closely to Hope Street for the first of four plays that the Everyman Company will bring to Liverpool audiences over the next few months.

Paint Your Wagon is a production of positive absolutes and is more valuable than any gold mine.

Ian D. Hall