Royal Academy of Music – The Wild Party

Picture: Richard Hubert Smith

The Wild Party was performed by the Royal Academy of Music at the Susie Sainsbury Theatre, London.

Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Although I hated The Wild Party, such was the brilliance of the direction (Hannah Chissick), choreography (Chris Whittaker), set design (David Harris), all the dancing and most of the acting/singing, it would be churlish to deny it five stars.

For me, every musical should have someone to root for but Michael John LaChiusa’s 2000 Broadway flop – it lasted 68 performances – has 20 mostly decadent characters, some depraved, some violent, and not one of them easy to love.

Based on a poem by Joseph Moncure March (as was a rival Wild Party by Andrew Lippa which played Off-Broadway the same year and must have caused confusion), LaChiusa and George C Wolfe’s book explores themes of sex (several varieties), love, booze, drugs, obsession, addiction and murder in prohibition-era Manhattan and pulls no punches.

To a 1920s-inspired jazz score, robustly interpreted by RAM’s own 16-piece orchestra under musical director William Bullivant, we are introduced to the characters, two by two, Noah’s Ark style.

Queenie (Roshani Abbey, who shared the main role with Lily Kerhoas over the six performances) and the loud, unhinged Burrs (Connor Jones, making the most of a gift of a part), two on-the-slide vaudevillians who live together far from harmoniously, decide to throw a party to spice up their lives.

The guests are a motley crew of washed-up stars and ambitious wannabes, plus a black ex-boxer Eddie (Paul Mukembo), his white trophy wife Mae (Jas Nisic) and her Lolita-like underage sister Nadine who can’t wait to experiment with cocaine and bootleg gin (Jane Wei, an eye-catching characterisation).

There are also two Jewish producers (Nitai Levi and Kristian Roche) whom Queenie is hoping to tap for some work, a guy called Jackie (Anton Schweizer) who is after sex with anything that moves and Queenie’s bestie Kate (Mared Williams) whose slimy gigolo of a younger boyfriend (Tom Hirst) quickly has reciprocated designs on the hostess.

One bisexual guest’s pun: “I spent many years in Paris studying at the Sore-Bum” earned a cheap laugh in a piece supposedly darkly comic but jokes were few and far between.

The party descends into outpourings of regrets, recriminations and revenge. There’s a flamboyant lesbian stripper Madelaine (Alix Efaw, with first-rate vocals on ‘Everyone Has Their Secrets’) and her latest, drug-fuelled pick-up Sally (Cecilia Jarved, so thrilling on ‘After Midnight Dies’ we could have done with more of her).

Adriana Ivelisse as the voracious Dolores had some big stilettos to fill as the part was played by Eartha Kitt on Broadway and Donna McKechnie in the recent London revival at The Other Palace but she made it her own and sang ‘When It Ends’ to perfection.

Oisin Nolan-Power and Sake Wijers as the incestuously-bonded D’Armano brothers Oscar and Phil dance up a storm with their backdrop silhouettes heightening the effect.

There were plenty of songs, too many really, and 37 of them at the last count in a straight two-hour run-through, but there was a sameness about them until we got to some strong ballads towards the end.

Queenie’s ‘What I Need’ and ‘This Is What It Is’ were well delivered by Roshani Abbey.

Ensemble parts in the Cast Z show I saw were taken by Yasmeen Audi, Alissa Finn, Lily Kerhoas, Kody Mortimer and Amber Quinn. They all had bigger parts when Cast A were operating.

Director Chissick started off at a fair old lick and never let up, helped by wonderful in-period outfits (costume design by Simon Wells), in a humdinger of a team effort by the RAM final-year Musical Theatre graduates. I just wish I could have liked It more.

Jeremy Chapman