Funny Girl at the Savoy

It was another West End trip for myself and Nanny Cora last weekend (18^th June 2016) to see Funny Girl at the Savoy Theatre on the Strand in London. Of course it was a fantastic trip with laughter and giggles and the show was amazing. A new underground was visited by Nanny Cora, High Barnet, as we would be on the Northern line. I was very impressed with the disabled access at High Barnet as there was no need to use stairs. However despite a quick energetic spurt my Nanny Cora we missed the train by seconds so we thought while there we can have a quick toilet break until the next train to Charing Cross arrived. The toilets were absolutely minging, I was nearly sick and I will definitely not be going to them public toilets again, funny though! London is full of wonderful people and me and Nanny Cora both like to people watch and comment on all the lovely people we meet. We also reminisced about when me, her and Grandad went to the London Eye, the weather being awful we went to some random pub which is on The Strand next to the Savoy and laughed about that. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to pop to Trafalgar Square to see a bit of West End Live but I am sure it was a fabulous day.    

Funny Girl is a semi-biographical musical about Fanny Brice, the American Broadway star and comedian. The story focuses on her career and relationship with Nick Arnstein. Funny Girl made its Broadway appearance in 1964, starring Barbara Streisand who went on to star in the 1968 film of the same name which was based on the musical. I have wanted to see Funny Girl for ages as there is one song everyone will know as it has featured in huge films and has become one of those songs people forget comes from a musical, I’ll let you guess, answer below. Streisand reprised her role for the West End production which came to the Prince of Wales theatre in 1966. Since its close in Broadway (in 1967) and the West End (I think also in 1967) there had been some minor national tours but no actual full scale revival until 2015 at the Menier Chocolate Factory in London. I tried to get tickets but couldn’t as it sold out within one day. The revival had a new revised book by Tony Award winner Harvey Fierstein (original by Isobel Lennart who went on to write the film adaptation), known for his work on La Cage Aux Folles, Kinky Boots and starring in Hairspray. When it was announced this revival would be moving to the Savoy for a limited period I needed to get tickets. Funny Girl, despite its well-known score and huge fan base, has not won any significant awards. The London production was before the introduction of the Lawrence Olivier Award and the Broadway production was nominated for 8 1964 Tony Awards however not winning any, mainly due to that year being up against Hello Dolly.

Funny Girl was due to star Sheridan Smith as Fanny, and she received mostly rave reviews from her time at the Menier and then the transfer to the Savoy. However due to recent difficulties she has faced in her personal life she has been indisposed for about 6 weeks I think now. Since her indisposition her understudy, Natasha J Barnes, has taken on the role of Fanny Brice, who starred as Brice after Smith’s departure from the Menier production. Barnes’ performance is fantastic and she received an immediate standing ovation as she entered the stage for the final time at curtain call. She absolutely deserved this reaction and goes to show how much understudies are often undervalued. Barnes’ own reaction to this standing ovation goes to show how genuine she is and how much she appreciated every clap she heard. She was really really good. It must have been absolutely terrifying taking on this role for 8 performances a week. Barnes is naturally funny, and I think you would have to be, taking on the role of Fanny Brice. Parts of the show you could tell a joke had to be written in but it was her facial expressions and natural witty presence on stage that made her Brice unmissable. It was the Rat-tat-tat-tat scene that had me in stitches, first of all I wasn’t sure if this was part of the comedic writing, but it became apparent that her fake moustache was not supposed to keep falling off, but it did, and even Barnes’ had to laugh at some point. It is this part of theatre and watching musicals live that I absolutely love, each performance is different and this was certainly a funny part of the show. As well as funny and genuine Barnes had a wonderful voice and her version of ‘Don’t rain on my parade’ was fantastic, especially the reprise during the finale. I was originally gutted about not seeing Sheridan Smith, and I wish her all the best for getting better, but similar to my experience of Sunset Boulevard, I am very pleased to have experienced Natasha J Barnes as Fanny Brice.

The hunk of the show, Nick Arnstein, is played by Darius Campbell, known better by his single first name for Pop Idol and Popstars. Since this he has gone on to be a platinum selling recording artist, actor and film producer. I didn’t know this was Darius until after the show where I took a much closer look at the programme; couldn’t properly due to the horrible seats of the Savoy. Darius plays Arnstein well; his suave handsomely rugged appearance is lovely to watch and his singing is obviously good, albeit the role of Nick Arnstein is not the biggest singing part in the musical. I also can’t believe how bloody tall he is, especially as Fanny is typically played by a short actress. There were two other members of the company who I really enjoyed watching, Marilyn Cutts playing Fanny’s Mother Mrs Brice and Joel Montague playing Eddie Ryan, the guy who is secretly in love with Fanny (I believe) and who helps her be the star she becomes. The song these two sing together, ‘Who taught her everything she knows?’ was also one of my favourite of the show and shows the distance Fanny is creating between her previous self to her new found fame. Both these stage actors are a real credit to this production of Funny Girl.

Talking about the score, with music composed by Jule Styne (Gypsy) and lyrics by Bob Merrill, it has become one of musical theatre’s much loved soundtracks, with the most poignant and well known having to be ‘Don’t rain on my parade’ which has featured in many TV shows and films since its creation; this lead me to want to see Funny Girl in the first place. With a gorgeous Overture and Entr’acte by Styne, other songs that grace the audience every night include, ‘People’, ‘You are woman, I am man’, ‘Henry Street’, ‘Sadie, Sadie’ and ‘The music that makes me dance’. I have to admit the score hasn’t left a particular song in my head as many musicals do and I am not rushing to download the Funny Girl soundtrack but it did have some great tunes; I would say Gypsy, Styne’s other massive hit, has a better composition of songs than Funny Girl does.

Michael Mayer directs this new production of Funny Girl with Michael Pavelka designing the set. The staging I felt was fairly minimal with usually only a few props, table and chair on stage at any one time. The thing I absolutely loved about the staging, which reminded me of when I saw Mrs Henderson Presents, was how Pavelka portrays a theatre stage when on a theatre stage. This was for me the best part of the staging and it worked really well. With direction from Mayer transition from front of stage to backstage was seamless. The lighting for me was fantastic in this show and when I found out Mark Henderson (winner of this year’s Olivier Best Lighting award for Gypsy) was behind this I wasn’t surprised. Henderson has produced some fantastic lighting for productions and Funny Girl is not exempt from this. During the Overture the graceful, slow appearance of a lilacly stage on a stage was beautiful and throughout the show it was theatrical when it needed to be and emotional when it was necessary. The scenes for when Fanny is on stage as a performer the choreography is good but not overwhelming. Costume design again was great for Fanny Brice (I loved the theatrical war scene costume for Barnes) and everyone was dressed appropriately for that era and the needs of the scene.

It is strange that it has taken around 50 years for a full Funny Girl revival, since some of the songs are well known musical theatre songs. Funny Girl is at the end of the day a musical comedy and it did genuinely make me laugh, albeit sometimes not intentionally. Saying that, Funny Girl is an emotional production depicting the life of Fanny Brice and how fame is not all it is cracked up to be, possibly reflecting aspects of current life for some. The last few scenes really do have an impact on the audience and Barnes performance brought her to tears, she was fully deserving of her standing ovation and I wish her all the luck for the rest of her time as Fanny Brice and everything for the future. Funny Girl is playing at the Savoy until October 2016, where Dreamgirls will take over residency at the Savoy (I still need to get my tickets, I will do this Beez!). I hope it is not another 50 years until Funny Girl graces the stage of the West End or the wider UK theatres on tour. Please get in touch on Twitter AaronBurgess89