Brighton Year-Round 2024

An Officer and a Gentleman

Jamie Wilson, Jack Maple, Gavin Kalin, Kevin McCollum and Jason Haigh-Ellery for the Curve Production

Genre: Adaptation, American Theater, Live Music, Mainstream Theatre, Musical Theatre, Theatre

Venue: Theatre Royal Brighton

Festival: Brighton Year-Round

Low Down

Review

It might seem a strange time when U.S. firepower isn’t exactly flavour of the year, but in 2018 screenwriter Douglas Day Stewart adapted his 1982 film An Officer and a Gentleman with Sharleen Cooper Cohen into a musical; with a period jukebox score by Ken Hirsch and Robin Lerner. This Curve production directed by Nikolai Foster arrives on tour at Theatre Royal, Brighton till April 27^th.

This is a show to see for three reasons: yet another stunning British ensemble, no big names, just ones to watch for giving big performances particularly singing; terrific gantry-scaffolded set with metalled props and sharp costumes by Michael Taylor, with Ben Cracknell’s predictably excellent lighting; and a longer second half that delivers the story.

Raw – and in this musical roaring – naval air force recruits arrive to be lashed into shape by Gunnery Sergeant Foley (Jamal Kane Crawford) whose bite’s worse than his bark. They want to be jet pilots but few will make that: some will quit altogether. And for entertainment there’s a group of factory women whose ticket out of there is marrying a pilot. So Carmen, and so not.

So wrong-side-of-the-tracks Zack Mayo (Luke Baker) whose father’s a naval rating meets training nurse Paula Pokrifki (Georgia Lennon), who’s avowedly not looking for romance, but is.

And his bestie posh Admiral’s son Sid Worley (Danny Whelan on this occasion) meets slinky Lynette Pomeroy (Julia Jones on this occasion) who’s a bit more open to suggestions. But can they bridge the divide? ‘I was Made For Loving You’ features the romantic quartet, and ‘I Want to Know what Love Is’ the two leads at a point that might have been even finer if left to more quiet.

Jones leads ‘Material Girl’ where Whelan’s ‘Family Man’ is the most agonised song of the evening.

Tensions build for all during the 12-week killer course where fellow recruits Casey Seegar (Olivia Foster-Browne) aspires to be the first woman jet-pilot, and is another stand-out and it’s good too she leads ‘When The Going gets Tough’ where her cut-through burnished voice is given free rein. There’s less storyline for the promising Lucas Piquero playing Cuban Eduardo Cortez, and Chris Breistein’s Louis Perryman.

Parentally the great act of the evening too is Melanie Masson’s Esther Pokrifki, who owns the space and her ‘Woman’ is the moment of the evening. It’s plangent, passionate and Masson releases the full volume of her delivery at a spellbinding moment, alongside Lennon.

She’s often joined harmonically by Wendi Harriot’s Aunt Bunny. At the opposite end is Tim Rogers’ gruff Bryon Mayo, never believing in his son, or so he says, though they share a number, ‘Blaze of Glory’ here with sardonic competitive edge.

All sing superbly, including the two covers Whelan and Baker, rightly entrusted on a press night for this leg of the tour. Baker truly grows into his role, proving superbly athletic too, and Lennon in such standards as ‘Heart of Glass’ is piercingly fine. She and Jones nail the melancholic joy of ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ with melting duetting too.

The first shorter half of 58 minutes is frankly underwhelming. The unusually longer second half at 72 minutes redeems this musical. Tom Marshall’s sound is meant to deliver the F14 Tomcat noise (lit up in stencil by Cracknell for much of the time) but the pace and unrelenting pounding of military life as imagined here is relentless.

As someone who stayed on airbases, even serviced RAF aircraft, I can attest the quiet in such open spaces is often overwhelming, almost the dominant feature. The band led by musical director Christopher Duffy is extremely fine, but singers’ voices have to punch through a huge volume and this must cause long-term strain.

Points of repose do come in the second half with no sound whatsoever, and are the better for it. We could have enjoyed a few earlier in intimate scenes. Some songs too could flourish with simpler lines.

There’s fine support to from James Wilkinson-Jones’ angry civilian Troy and Lukin Simmonds’ Hooper his second; Etisyai Philip’s Factory Girl, Mia Harrison’s Factory Woman, Will May and Ellie-Grace Cousins.

What brings this musical home is the drawing-together of threads that hang loose in Act One, as if we had to get four characters in a clinch then twist, at the end of the act: it takes too long, and at the expense of further unbalancing the acts could be cut down.

The unusually longer Act Two involves darker themes, including misogyny and racism, unexpected twists and tragedy. And finally you believe in a story that doesn’t flinch from darkness and sings its distress. It allows the lovers who come through a burst of well-earned joy and applause. Tough love aside on that first act, thoroughly enjoyable.

Published April 24, 2024April 24, 2024 by Simon Jenner