There’s a reason Chicago is one of my favourite musicals. It’s upbeat, sassy, and satisfyingly risqué. The music is top notch, the lyrics very clever and the story is a heady mix of satire and intrigue.
The plot focusses on Roxie Hart (Nomi Cohen) an ambitious vamp who is desperate for stardom and an escape from her pedestrian marriage. Embarking on an affair with, of all people, a furniture salesman, she hopes to hit the big time in Vaudeville. When her lover spurns her she murders him and so kicks off a sensational murder trial. Set in 1930s Chicago with all that era’s contradictions around sex and alcohol the show pokes fun at human folly and hypocrisy. Supposedly, nobody likes crime, but we are all fascinated by it.
In prison she comes under the corrupt power of matron Mama Morton (Jackie Clarke) who is only too happy to help the ‘chickies’ in her jail provided they pay. Roxie butts heads with another ‘star’ inmate, Velma Kelly (Lily Bourne) who gunned down her husband and sister after catching them in flagrante in a seedy motel. Eventually Roxie heads to court defended by legendary lawyer and complete rake Billy Flynn (Joel Tobeck) who uses flattery, deception and outright falsehoods to win the case. Flynn claims all he cares about is love, but in reality his one true passion is his $5,000 fee.
The musical is full of really great songs which are instantly recognisable and they were sung incredibly well by this talented cast. Jackie Clarke’s When Your’e Good to Mama was perfect and she fully embraced the femme fatale persona and captured the matron’s grasping personality. Andy Grainger as Amos played the simple husband with a great deal of tenderness which brought a good deal of sympathy to one who is generally the butt of jokes in this story. His rendition of Mr Cellophane was deeply moving.
Cohen and Bourne were equally strong and passionate in their roles and when they sang together in My Own Best Friend the combination was electric. Roxie Hart is a very interesting character and Cohen played her with a lot of ego and a rawness that was fascinating. Tobeck gave Flynn a rougher demeanour – sure the charm was there, but the actor cleverly showed us the rotten core behind the ‘razzle dazzle’.
There were some interesting stylistic choices in the show particularly in costuming.
The cast were mostly in burlesque type outfits throughout the show. At one point a man was dressed in leather pants and a rubber dog mask. There were rubber sex dolls included, quite amusingly, in the dance routine for We Both Reached for the Gun; and Mama Morton was dressed like a hooker. Roxie and Velma were portrayed as Alley Cat kind of characters which played into what i assume was a desire to ramp up the seedier aspects of humanity.
For me though, the Jazz Age and this musical in particular have a mystique and glamour to them and I would have liked to have seen a touch more ritziness in the costuming for the main cast.
On opening night there were some technical wobbles including some very obvious audio problems which were most pronounced towards the final moments of the show and which eventually required an on-stage replacement of Cohen’s microphone. That moment was handled with aplomb and Cohen continued without missing a beat. But even earlier in the show, particularly during Bourne’s opening number, there were some sound issues that meant occasionally the singing was not heard to its fullest or best. This is no reflection on the cast who, as mentioned above, all delivered exceedingly well.
Thankfully, these issues did not fatally damage what was a boisterous, energetic and confident production.
Photo credit – Dave Simpson Photography
CHICAGO
31 July – 9 August
Bruce Mason Theatre, Takapuna Auckland
