Cybersocket Abroad: Life Is An Overhyped Cabaret – A Review of The West End’s Hottest Ticket

Before I got to London, all of my fellow die-hard theatre friends asked the same question, “Omg! Were you able to get tickets to the new Cabaret on the West End?! It’s supposed to be incredible!” I did manage to get a single seat to an otherwise sold out performance on the Monday after Easter, and let me just tell you it was SO… fine.

Cabaret, for those who don’t know, is decidedly one of the Queerest musicals/movies in history. Based on Christopher Isherwood's 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin and adapted by the iconic duo of Kander & Ebb, and originally directed by the truest master of ceremonies Bob Fosse, Cabaret was gender-bending before gender-bending was mainstream, and it was hyper sexual in a way that pushed mainstream society’s boundaries in the most wonderful of ways. The show centers around a young British cabaret performer named Sally Bowles (based on real-life 19-year old cabaret performer Jean Ross) in pre-WWII Germany. The Nazis are just starting to take a hold in Berlin when Bowles meets a young Queer writer named Clifford Bradshaw (a stand-in for Isherwood), and the two form a relationship that is somewhere between platonic and sexual, but decidedly love-filled. As the Nazi’s strengthen their hold on the city and the culture, the cast of Queer and Jewish characters start to realize their existences are no longer secure.

Every production of Cabaret follows a similar pattern: scantily clad women as the Kit Kat Club dancers, a routinely drunken Sally Bowles, and an Emcee who is decidedly lithe, Queer, and a coupling of both silly and terrifying. As much as I had been led to believe that this Olivier-winning production at London’s Playhouse Theatre was somehow different, it was the exact same production that we all know and love, save for a few great details.

Stealing the show completely was the set design by Tom Scutt. It was a truly breathtaking transformation of the space as a theatre-in-the-round concept complete with 1920s architectural and visual design. The stage itself was a two-piece circle, where the outer ring rotated around the stationary center. They used the rotation to great effect, although at times I wish the director had swapped who stayed stationary and who revolved around the center to better reflect themes within the story. The problem is no theatre goer ever wants to leave a production of a musical– least of all Cabaret –saying, “The best part of the show was the set.”

Photo Credit: Mark Fox

The original cast of this production showcased Eddie Redmayne as the famed Emcee. This role is considered one of the most coveted roles in all of theatre, and has been previously played to great success by Alan Cumming, and most notably by the OG Joel Grey, who won both a Tony and an Oscar, for his performances on Broadway and in the film, respectively. The role has always been portrayed as high-femme, caked in makeup, and half-naked. This production didn’t delineate from that framework, save for the fact that they dressed him up more as a Commedia Dell’Arte clown as opposed to the standard no shirt + suspenders or tux in the case of Grey. He finished his contract with the production a few weeks back, and I saw his replacement, Fra Fee. Fee seemed to be an outstanding actor (and one of our own!), but like the rest of the cast was just misdirected in a way that made him “nothing special” as far as I could tell. A solid voice, to be sure, but not much past that in a mostly misdirected production.

Photo: Marc Brenner

Photo: Marc Brenner

In the roles of Sally Bowles and Cliff Bradshaw were Amy Lennox and Omar Baroud, who were both perfectly acceptable, but, again, nothing special. Baroud as the overly-naïve Bradshaw was particularly unimpressive in act one, because he was just hitting the “naïve writer” over the head a bit too much. When that naiveté is shattered going into Act II, the actor finally got to spread his wings a bit, and I saw the darker side of Cliff, as well as the stronger performer in Baroud. One thing I’ve always loved about this show is the muddy relationship between Bowles and Bradshaw. Cliff is decidedly gay, but he also finds a deep love for Sally, as shown through his commitment to the idea of raising a child with her. But, like so many other “great aspects to this production,” the genius lies in the script and not necessarily in the particular production. I will say that it's worth mentioning how ridiculously sexy Omar Baroud is as an actor. Oof.

Photo: Marc Brenner

Photo: Marc Brenner

Only one actor impressed me from start to finish: Vivien Parry as apartment owner Fraulein Schneider. Schneider is the no-bullshit keeper of the inn who tries to no avail to keep Sally’s promiscuity in check, in no small part due to the fact that she is also having her own little tryst with a local fruit vendor (who happens to be Jewish). Schneider and Herr Schultz (the Jewish fruit vendor) fall madly in love and decide to get married, before one of the local Nazis aggressively advises against it, and Frau Schneider agrees fearing for the safety of her livelihood, to say nothing of her actual safety. The role is one of “surviving at all costs,” a point Schneider makes clear to an overly (if not admirably) altruistic Cliff. From start to finish Parry showcased the struggle of an older woman trying to survive yet another trauma in early 20th Century Berlin. “All my life I have managed for myself,” Schneider declares, “and it is too old a habit to change.” She continues, “I have battled alone, and I have survived. There was a war—and I survived. There was a revolution, for one loaf of bread—but I survived! And if the Nazis come, I will survive. And if the communists come, I will still be here, renting out these rooms! For in the end what other choice have I? This is my world! I regret very much returning the fruit bowl [a wedding gift from Sally and Cliff]. It is truly magnificent. I regret everything.”

Photo: Marc Brenner

One thing I loved about this production was that the Kit Kat Club’s cabaret performers were both women and men. That’s hardly anything new in terms of productions, but for a show as decidedly Queer as Cabaret, it should almost always be the case going forward. The actors who played the Kit Kat Club performers were all terrific as an ensemble, and wow were they flexible. It definitely put a few dirty thoughts into my already very dirty mind.

This production, like every other production, has the Emcee transform from high-femme master of ceremonies to representing the evils of Nazi Germany, in addition to acting as a stand-in for all of the Queers who died in the Holocaust. The problem was that because there was nothing overly unique about any of this production, I found myself saying, “Yeah, I got it” throughout the entire show. I want to be half a step behind the show, not three steps ahead of it. If you’ve seen the musical before, you know that many a production end with “the moment after” clearly representing the gas chambers of the Holocaust. This production brilliantly used the rotating stage to show the non-stop rotation of victims who were quite literally an assembly line of death.

I’m sure this production will eventually head to Broadway, and will receive all of the acclaim it has gotten in Europe, but I just ask the theatre goers one question: Is this production anything THAT special? Where is the horrifically dark version of Cabaret? Instead of Eddie Redmayne dressed as a fay clown, I want to see Alfred Molina shirtless smoking a cigar. I want to see track marks on the arms of Sally, and I want to see the Kit Kat Club dancers naked and fucking, pushing the boundaries of Queer expression even further. Let’s evolve this production; let’s do something different, hm? But if you want to see a “perfectly beautiful girl” in a “perfectly beautiful room” then you’ll probably love this perfectly fine production.

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