Ross William Wild and Michael Vinsen in Bare – The Rock Musical at the Greenwich Theatre, London. Picture: Roy Tan
Bare – The Rock Musical continues at the Greenwich Theatre, London until 27 October.
Set in present day Massachusetts, Bare – The Rock Musical tells a story of a group of teenagers at St Cecilia’s Boarding School. Central to the plot is the relationship between Peter, a softly spoken young man attempting to come to terms with his homosexuality, and Jason, athletic and popular but unwilling to make public his relationship with Peter. The focus for Bare’s narrative is the adolescent angst that proliferates in the school environment from issues of sex and image to drug abuse and death. Stereotyping and clichés may abound, as they often might in any piece of musical theatre, but there is genuine heart at the centre of this piece that draws its audience in. Once you have committed to the sung-through style and adapted to the language, you are there for the ride and only really come a cropper at the end, where the show flounders awkwardly, steeped in unflattering sentimentality.
Easily the most likeable character in the story is Peter, played with remarkable clarity by Michael Vinsen. Peter’s journey through the story is a complex one, and Vinsen’s grasp of the more subtle moments within the score are often the most powerful scenes of the evening. For example ‘See Me’, where Peter desperately tries to come out to his mother, will resonate with many people on many levels, but here it is simply about a boy who wants to be honest with the people he loves.
Peter’s love interest Jason is played by Ross William Wild. It’s a meaty role for any young actor to take on as this character is the lynch-pin for much of the narrative, but Wild’s energy, power and soaring rock vocals, from the heart-felt ‘You & I’ to the visceral ‘Ever After’ is exemplary here. There is equally strong support in the company, notably from Molly Stewart as Jason’s acerbic sister Nadia. Stewart may deliver the hearty ‘Plain Jane Fat Ass’ with all the vehemence of a tormented teen, but the real strength here is what is held back. With so much verbose rock-recitative within the score, Stewart’s Nadia, with her bitchy comments thinly disguising a host of insecurities, rings true.
On the adult front, dangerously on the verge of stealing the show is Claudia Kariuki as Sister Chantelle. If Kariuki’s turn as the sassy, tell-it-like-it-is drama-teaching nun doesn’t get you, then her switch to sassy, tell-it-like-it-is Virgin Mary, swathed in gold and supported by girl-group angels, has to raise a smile.
Undoubtedly one of the striking features of this production is the design by David Shields. A cavernous stage to fill, Shields’ bold use of texture and colour, featuring lead glass windows, tracery and exposed brick walls, fills the entire stage and bleeds into the auditorium, echoing the hints of religious oppression in the narrative. Tim Deiling’s sensitive lighting design complements this perfectly, whether pouring coloured light through the windows into the chapel or flooding the space with rave effects to echo the emotional context of Damon Intrabartolo’s throbbing score (book by Intrabartolo and Jon Hartmere, lyrics by Hartmere).
Until the difficult ending, Bare is a constant surprise and this production, a transfer from the Union Theatre, is particularly stong on many levels. Director Paul Taylor-Mills really knows how to work a big stage and his team, including choreographer Richard Jones and musical director Thomas Turner, corral a young cast to create one of the best productions Greenwich will have seen in a long time. The subject matter and music may not be to everybody’s taste, but the energy, execution and raw talent on display is an encouraging sign the future of musical theatre is in safe hands.
Paul Vale
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