By, John Nathan
2 min read
ByJohn Nathan, John Nathan
There's no doubting Gemma Arterton's range. The former Bond girl was last on stage as a serene Duchess of Malfi and now here she is as factory worker and reluctant strike leader Rita O'Grady.
This new musical's story, based on the 2010 film, pays tribute to the 200 women workers at Ford's Dagenham car plant who went on strike for equal pay. And, as the heroine at the sharp end of the dispute, Arterton transmits all the world-weary stoicism of a working mum.
But where she really scores is in the transition from political shrinking violet to sharp-tongued thorn in the side of the period's all-too-frequent male chauvinists. Mark Hadfield's Harold Wilson - a prime minister besieged by an imploding economy - is typical. "The war's over. Why are women working?" results in a collective gasp from the audience.
This is a show that not only wears its feminism on its sleeve, but its admiration for rights won by the Labour movement. And rightly so.
Yet it is also oddly patronising of its heroes. David Arnold's score has its tender moments, such as when stalwart unionist Connie (Isla Blair) laments the age-old tale of promised changes that never come. But, in its attempt to capture the spirit of the working classes, David Arnold's music seems to have been inspired chiefly by football chants.
I kept thinking that everyone was going to break into a rendition of Chelsea's 1972 anthem Blue is the Colour, which, for West Ham supporting east Londoners, would have been doubly wrong.
Director Rupert Goold has lamented the lack of great British musicals, comparing this country's output of musical theatre unfavourably to America's, which is fair enough.
But in American shows there tends to be no less ambition in the material for characters born on the rough side of the tracks. Frank Loesser gave his wittiest songs to the meatheads of Guys and Dolls. It's probably unfair to compare anyone to him, but Goold started it.
Here, the producers have compiled a stellar team of British creative talent who deserve great expectations from the audience.
Goold is a serial hit-machine (Charles III and American Psycho), book writer Richard Bean is the wit behind One Man, Two Guvnors and lyricist Richard Thomas composed and wrote Jerry Springer the Opera. And he provides some of this show's funniest lines, particularly when Steve Furst struts his stuff as Tooley, the American Ford executive who has contempt for everything British. "We got Hollywood and Vegas too, you got Thames TV and Whipsnade Zoo."
But the working class Brits simply aren't allowed anything as knowing. Instead, the show opts for broad humour where it might have chosen more heart. Hadfield's Wilson and Furst's Tooley are buffoonish, cartoonish caricatures. They're fun to watch but they deny the show the sense that Arterton's Rita is fighting against formidable odds.
Still, she gets terrific support from some of the other factory floor workers, especially Sophie Stanton's foul mouthed Beryl, and Sophie-Louise Dann as a formidable Barbara Castle also deserves a mention. But to be moved and uplifted by a strike-inspired musical, its not Dagenham you should visit but Billy Elliot.