Sasha Regan’s All-Male H.M.S. Pinafore – Wilton’s Music Hall

12. Juan Jackson Captain of the All-Male H.M.S. Pinafore by Mark Senior

Sasha Regan’s All-Male H.M.S. Pinafore continues at Wilton’s Music Hall, London until 9 April 2022.

Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩

I’m happy to report that this show, which I first saw at Cambridge Arts in 2016, is maturing well like fine wine or good cheese.

A riot of theatrical exuberance and creativity, it bears no resemblance to the staging that narrowly focused WS Gilbert insisted on but is pretty respectful of his words and of Arthur Sullivan’s music, although there have been some subtle key changes to accommodate the all-male cast.

We’re on a Second World War battleship and the set begins and ends with two sets of bunkbeds on castors which Sasha Regan re-imagines as boat rails, small vessels and lots of other things. The men – in their drill shorts and T-Shirts – are amusing themselves by “play acting” and using as props and costumes anything that happens to be around.

Meanwhile Lizzi Gee’s muscular choreography whizzes seamlessly round the stage and the apron area – sometimes angular, sometimes balletic and often gymnastic. Skipping and press-ups in time to Sullivan’s high octane melodies are great fun – and slickly impressive.

When I saw Juan Jackson in Five Guys Named Moe at Upstairs at the Gatehouse last year I commented that his bass voice is so magnificently rich that he could sing classical opera. Well, here he is doing it. Mozart next? As Captain Corcoran – and with muscles like Mr Atlas – he is a real showstealer: funny, hilariously athletic and a voice to die for.

David McKechnie gives us a wittily earnest Sir Joseph Porter in his braces, hat and sock suspenders looking like a cross between William Morris and a geeky first generation Boy Scout.

Sam Kipling hits all the high notes as Josephine although of course he is not the soprano the part was written for and his voice is harsher and heavier than we’re used to hearing. He is a very affecting actor, though – just camp enough to be funny but also bringing real depth to a character who doesn’t know what she wants because her heart and her head are telling her different things.

Scott Armstrong is wryly funny as Little Buttercup – pulling her goods for sale out of his mess box and later making overtures to Corcoran (according to Gilbert’s daft plot she’s old enough to be his mother but we’ll let that pass).

And it’s good to see Danny Becker – an accomplished tenor – as Ralph Rackstraw and bringing dignity to the role.

Music is provided by MD, Ashley Jacobs, on piano below stage left. He supports the action well although the notes occasionally fail to fall under his fingers. The protracted vamp lead-in to McKechnie’s big number during which there is lots of procrastinatory stage business is nicely managed.

The ensemble morphs between male chorus and female chorus sometimes splitting to do both and sub-splitting again for Sullivan’s trademark double choruses. Intonation and diction are both generally strong although ‘A British Tar’ was initially mis-pitched at the performance I saw.

What do you do with the opening line of ‘For He is an English Man’ in the present climate of war and horror? Gilbert wrote: “For he might have been a Russian” (pronounced with a long ‘u’). Wisely, it is fudged in this production with a word I didn’t catch but which doesn’t rhyme with Prussian.

I’ve been a G&S lover all my life and have, over the years, come to the conclusion that the material is so strong that you can pull it any direction you like and it simply bounces back. Sasha Regan’s approach proves my point. So does the fact that most of the audience were singing to themselves as they left – I could hear it in the foyers, in the loos and en route back to the tube.

Susan Elkin