Stuffed with top performances, Play On! is a gloriously musical take on Twelfth Night at the Lyric Hammersmith
“Now that the stars are in your eyes
I’m beginning to see the light”
Play On! arrives in London after a UK tour as a – deep breath – Lyric Hammersmith Theatre, Talawa Theatre Company, Belgrade Theatre, Birmingham Hippodrome, Liverpool Everyman & Playhouse, and Wiltshire Creative co-production. Hopefully this has been a commercially successful collaboration that points to productive ways to work in the future as creatively, it is fire.
A loose adaptation of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night conceived by Sheldon Epps, Cheryl L West’s book relocates the action to the jazz scene 1940s Harlem, in the hallowed halls of the Cotton Club. Music, mischief and mayhem play out in a different but familiar manner, soundtracked by a suite of rousing tunes from Duke Ellington and delivered by a phenomenally talented company.
Viola here becomes Vy, an enthusiastic young songwriter who arrives in New York City to be told it is a man’s world. Encouraged to disguise herself as a man to get a foot in the door in the music industry, Vyman is soon wooing the club’s star singer Lady Liv at the behest of impresario The Duke for whom she’s falling hard. And around them, all matter of romantic shenanigans play out and play on in the supporting characters.
Michael Buffong’s production embraces something of a retro-futuristic vibe in Liam Godwin’s sparky musical arrangements and Kenrick H20 Sandy’s choreographic blending of street and jazz. And as a full-on musical, the vocal work is stunning. Earl Gregory’s smooth tone as The Duke would seduce anyone, so too the power of Koko Alexandra’s show-stopping Lady Liv. Tsemaye Bob-Egbe is highly charismatic whether Vy or Vyman and as the Malvolio-ish proxy, Cameron Bernard Jones’ Rev is utterly delightful.
If there’s any weakness, you could point to a slightly schematic ending to the second act, a lack of sophistication to the way each romantic plot is wrapped up. But mention of the reality of the racial politics of the time appropriately mixes some bitter into all the sweetness, perhaps to reflect some of the melancholy of the source material. And in the end, the overriding joyousness of the whole production proves to be just the thing.
