Thoroughly Modern Millie

article by: GrahamCleverly pictures by: Steve Eastward

When Thoroughly Modern Millie opened in New York in 2002 some critics were somewhat sceptical: the plot was flimsy, the music derivative, the jokes hoary, the presentation breathless, the creative imagination lacking....How very stuffy they were!

Last week such cobwebby thinking was blown away by the production directed by Dominique Vitali for Pirates at Dudelange. Of course the plot was flimsy - bright girl arrives in 1920s New York determined to marry a prince - oops! millionaire - and instead chooses her love for a poor boy who turns out to be an even greater prince -oops! millionaire - after adventuring her way through a palace - oops! high society night club - and a dungeon -oops- jail cell - and foiling the wiles of an evil Oriental and two broker's men - oops! Chinese laundrymen and ... but wait, why am I making these mistakes? Could this be?
Well, it nearly could. Except that it is from Broadway, and Broadway probably isn't yet ready for the full panoply of the British pantomime.
So, for instance there was no cross-dressing. Jimmy, the principal boy (Timothy Winters, a Pirates newcomer) was distinctly a boy, and while possibly he might slap a thigh or two one feels it probably wouldn't be his own. Phoebe Smith, another newcomer playing Millie, danced and sang athletically and vigorously enough for a principal boy but was resolutely female: so too was the more familiar Julie Fraser, deliciously evil as the caricatured Oriental dame figure Mrs Meers, eternally laying traps for the wispily feminine Elizabeth Venner, another newcomer as Miss Dorothy, permanently endangered as all principal girls are. (Was it only me wanting to shout: "Don't eat the apple! Don't eat the apple!..."?)

And then we had Muzzy, the slinkily sequinned fairy godmother whose every dress outlameed the last. Another welcome newcomer, Rota Ramanatsialonina, made up more than somewhat for Shirley Bassey not being available for the part. The rest of the principals were longtime Pirates stalwarts. Alex Teligadis was convincingly square as Millie's targeted millionaire/prince Trevor Graydon III, while Allison Kingsbury tapped like fury as the dragon, Miss Flannery, through whom Millie has to go to reach him.
Then two other familiar faces, Neil Johnson and Stephen Wilkie, rounded out the traditional parts as Mrs Meers' inscrutably Oriental and Chinese speaking laundrymen, Bun Foo and Ching Ho, agents of her foul plans to kidnap orphan girls for fates worse, presumably, than death - at least until the happy ending, at which point they stop stealing the show.

Which they do most with another nod to tradition, the singalong. Not that the Dudelange audience felt it was close enough to Christmas to let go and actually sing along (not on the night I went anyway), but we had the old favourite that everyone knows, plus a projection of the lyrics, (but no bouncing ball), necessary because what the cast themselves are singing goes in half-familiar part:.

Taiyang zhao long fang
Taiyang zhao xi fang
But you know where "taiyang zhao" best....

Correct. It's that well-known old favourite My Muqin. And yes, wo yuen zou baiwan li for one of those smiles too. Not that that's the only familiar melody around. Trevor, suddenly smitten by the sight of Miss Dorothy, launches into Victor Herbert to tunefully proclaim he has found the sweet mystery of life, and he is falling in love with someone - a sentiment only temporarily reciprocated and duetted by Miss Dorothy. Nothing if not eclectic, he and Millie and the writers also borrow a tune from Arthur Sullivan and Ruddigore to test how fast she can take dictation -and how fast both of them can sing, which is pretty speedy.

Which leaves, by my count, twenty-three singers and dancers and minor characters to effervesce across the stage, and for the two choreographers, director Dominique Vitali and Allison Kingsbury -- the tap routines, to organise and keep track of. But not a sparrow fell. In fact Ciara Barker's costumes were so gorgeous, sparrows hardly came to mind. From the opening Charleston on we are assured that for once, the dancing would not be the weaker facet of a Pirates production: one wonders where all the dancers suddenly came from.

How much was talent, how much choreographers' inspiration and direction? From the outside who can tell, and what does it matter?
Dancing requires support from the music too - and there were even more musicians than singers and dancers for Philip Dutton to wave his baton over and produce an impeccably driving but unobtrusive musical performance, ranging from ragtime (a long time since I saw that word used) to the orchestral, including a combination of the two with some syncopated Tchaikovsky.

It may be obvious that here was no solid dish to be taken as seriously as coq au vin de Mme Maigret or even judd mat gaardebounen. No - what we had here was undoubtedly a trifle, but one that showed how delicious a trifle can be when prepared and served by a confectioner as capable as Dominique Vitali. A director of a musical doesn't have as much freedom as a director usually has: apart from licensing restrictions, in the nature of things full-stage dance sequences don't give much room for lighting tricks and those of us who are sow's ears with regard to singing and dancing can't be transformed into silk purses. Like a football manager, that means his chief roles become holding out for just the right players, ensuring the action keeps flowing, and above all inspiring and enthusing the team. But whatever it took, this director had it.
So too did the producer, David Mittel. Producers don't usually get too much of a mention, but with a cast and crew as sprawling as this and - one guesses -the size of the budget, a very honourable one is indicated. Another is due to Karl Pierce for the complex sets and especially the projected backcloths - and, to get back to my original analogy, the transformation scene when we move to Muzzy's penthouse and the Cafe Society nightclub.

Summing up therefore, while maybe there was no clown with his pants falling down or a bride with a guy on the side, we did have a dance that's a dream of romance and a scene where the villain is mean, and as lack and Fred and Cyd would have joyfully agreed: That's Entertainment.
352culture 12-9-2009