All the talk of a public fearful of returning to full capacity theatres counted for nothing. True, some were wearing masks but most of the seats in one of London’s biggest theatres were filled cheek by jowl. Social distancing never felt so 2020.
No, instead of fear the emotion that surged through the auditorium as this musical progressed through the best known score in the canon was love. Adults mouthed Tim Rice’s lyrics and swayed to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s melodies. Children sat agog as the stage and set emitted most if not all the colours of Joseph’s dreamcoat. Tutankhamun himself might have thought Jason Donavan’s Pharaoh a little nouveau riche in his taste what with all the gold on display.
It doesn’t much matter that Donovan as the Elvis-inspired ruler is underpowered as was his Joseph 30 years ago. Nor that his co-stars Alexandra Burke (as the first black narrator) and Jac Yarrow reprising the title role bring the required amount of charisma to their roles, though not much more. Much more important is that Laurence Connor’s production skips through the emotions just as breezily as the score hops between its pastiche numbers. All this is exactly as it should be.
Cultural appropriation police have yet to target the Benjamin Calypso number for its un-abashed use of West Indian culture in an ancient Egyptian setting. If they did they might inadvertently do the show a favour by taking out the one dated use of tone deaf pastiche.
That said the country music twang used in One More Angel In Heaven is not only a complete delight but a reminder of the sheer command the young Lloyd Webber had of musical genres, just as Pharaoh’s Dream Explained is evidence that Rice landed as fully formed lyricist when the show was being created in their early 20s.
“All those things you saw in your pyjamas are a long-range forecast for your farmers” goes one line.“Find a man to lead you through the famine with flair for economic planning,” warns another.
Burke is a reliable narrator as she shepherds her flock of modern school children round the stage, the pretext for dwelling on a portion of the Torah. Yarrow delivers everything the role of Joseph demands. The Jungian dream interpreter was his professional debut in 2019 and here he reprises that performance by fully deploying the emotional extremes of the plot with all the depth of an emoticon. But anything deeper would be out of place. This is a show that exults in being nothing more extreme than very enjoyable.
Due to a cast member testing positive for Covid-19, performances of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat are currently suspended
