Picture: Robert Piwko
A Christmas Story The Musical continues at the Waterloo East Theatre, London until 22 December 2018.
Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
A Christmas Story is an ageing but well-loved family film. In the 35 years since the original film’s release, it has been shown on television countless times. This musical rendition, with score and lyrics by superstar duo Justin Paul and Benj Pasek and book by Joseph Robinette, finally makes a European debut after first being staged in the US back in 2009.
The show tells the tale of Ralphie Parker (Felix Hepburn), a boy with only one wish: to receive a Red Ryder BB gun for Christmas.
There is a lot to like about this production. With good (and some great) songs, a few hilarious moments and some genuinely warm Christmas cheer, it is unlikely that you’ll leave without a little more of that magical holiday spirit.
However, I can’t say that it truly grabbed me either. Act I is noticeably harder to go along with than the second. The story is hampered by an unfortunate front-loading of a couple of the weaker musical numbers and a little too much over-acting on the part of a few of the younger performers and I must confess at times I found my attention drifting.
When the first half is strong it hits its beats perfectly. The interaction between the four members of the Parker family, who are certainly a believable household, is what drives this act. Lucyelle Cliffe and Simon Willmont are pitch-perfect in both their performances as parents and their vocal delivery.
The real surprises are that both Ralphie (Hepburn) and his brother Randy (Ethan Manwaring) also shine in the vocal department. Manwaring’s character is given some of the sincerely funniest moments in the show and deals with them in a way befitting of a much more seasoned actor. Hepburn manages to carry off a performance that often involves his isolation on stage without so much as a blink.
The major sticking point is that most of this skill really comes into play in the latter portion of the production. Just before the interval comes a standout number much more in line with what is customarily seen of Pasek and Paul, as a sequence that is both funny and gripping.
This is the momentum that carries throughout Act II and delivers real warmth in the finale. Even in the weaker beginning, there is still much to admire; Gerald Armin’s direction, incorporating a very limited set – the diversity of which is ingenious – is very strong, and where Rhianne Stubbs’ choreography makes itself known, this too is highly enjoyable.
It is not so much that the production commits many faults, more that there are a few things missing. Some songs have little physicality added on stage; some performances lack the consistency and finesse that is so obviously present in others.
But, equally, there are some fabulous musical moments, cleverness and wit in both production and performance and sprinklings of that all-important Christmas magic.
Tom Martland
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