Caroline O’Connor and Gemma Sutton in The Rink at Southwark Playhouse, London. Pictures: Roy Tan
The Rink continues at the Southwark Playhouse, London until 23 June 2018.
Star rating: five stars ★★★★★
In an age where some of the biggest musicals are either faithful movie re-creations or give up on the form completely by being mere dance spectacles, it is good to welcome back the masterclass in musical theatre that is The Rink.
This is a piece that deserves to be rediscovered. The intelligence of Terrence McNally’s book is only matched by the richness of John Kander and Fred Ebb’s glorious score, even though most of the songs cannot be as easily extracted from their context as those of Cabaret and Chicago.
The 1984 Broadway production was destined to be a star vehicle, showcasing the larger than life talents of Chita Rivera and Liza Minnelli competing against each other at the Martin Beck Theatre for over six months, almost as if it the stage was a boxing ring instead of a roller skating rink.
Stewart Clarke in The Rink
Luckily for us, this revised version has indeed two genuine stars in the mother and daughter roles of Anna and Angel: the great Caroline O’Connor and Gemma Sutton.
The rest of the cast (all male) play the various love interests of the two female protagonists. Although Stewart Clarke as Anna’s husband Dino and Ross Dawes as Lino stand out, they all have their moments and their ensemble number to the title song is nothing short of spectacular.
From her first number ‘Chief Cook and Bottle Washer’, O’Connor owns the show. In addition, the decision to move Angel’s solo ‘Coloured Lights’ to the end of Act I – instead of opening it as in the original Broadway version – turns out to be a good one.
Clearly this Rink, brilliantly directed by Adam Lenson and choreographed by Fabian Aloise, is more about Anna than about Angel, with O’Connor holding the audience in the palm of her hand from the very beginning and Sutton growing on us more in Act II.
The production is less dark in tone and warmer in its approach, less about competition than the original anyway, and the pair’s duets – ‘The Apple Doesn’t Fall’ and ‘Wallflower’ – are pure delights with an obvious chemistry between the two stars.
Ross Dawes in The Rink
The score is so full of gems that it made me wonder why this jewel of a show was only done once and very briefly in London before at the Cambridge Theatre in 1988, with O’Connor as the understudy to Diane Langton, playing the daughter’s part.
The Rink’s non-linear narrative is all about dealing with the past, broken dreams and what “home” means to us.
To quote the director: “We all have to deal with the fact that there will be a future beyond us, but it does not mean that we should stubbornly cling to the past. The Rink shows us that, like theatre, moments in our lives are ephemeral. The best we can do is to enjoy them while we can, make memories with the people we love and not cling on to anything too tightly.”
Clearly a not-to-be-missed, brilliant production of an underrated masterpiece deserving a transfer after its run at the Southwark Playhouse, although for now it is the ideal venue for the delicacy of The Rink, enhancing the emotions by its intimacy.
Patrick Honoré
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