Djalenga Scott, Craig Revel Horwood and Jonny Fines in Annie at the New Wimbledon Theatre, London and Touring. Picture: Paul Coltas
Annie continues at the New Wimbledon Theatre, London until 14 November, then on tour until 11 June 2016.
Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
If Craig Revel Horwood was as tough on himself as he is on his hapless Strictly Come Dancing victims, he’d probably come up with a 7 for his showstopping performance as sozzled, unlovely orphanage matron Miss Hannigan in the touring revival of this enduringly popular musical.
But a full-house Wimbledon audience marked him up with a 9 judging from their rapturous applause, reserving the 10 for 12-year-old Isabella Pappas’ heartwarming and perfectly-pitched, not-too-schmaltzy Annie.
Quite right too. Miss Hannigan is a part that’s never knowingly underplayed (to paraphrase the John Lewis motto) but very easy to go too over the top with.
To his credit, Horwood never takes the role into panto mode – at least no more than Carol Burnett did in the 1982 movie – despite being armed with all relevant props including impressively padded falsies, high heels and a grotesque streaked ginger-ringlets wig.
If we hadn’t seen his name on the posters, we would probably not even have known it was CRH and fears that he might ‘drag’ his own persona into the story with a few adenoidal “dis-AR-sters’ or ‘AY-MAY-ZINGs’ proved totally unfounded.
Jonny Fines plays Rooster in the touring production of Annie. Picture: Roy Tan
He’s been playing her fab-u-lously up and down the land since the tour opened in Newcastle in July but there’s only a couple of more weeks to catch him – Lesley Joseph (who has been doing Saturdays while he’s on Strictly duties), Jodie Prenger and Elaine C Smith will be taking turns from December – and as very much a flavour of the month, he does put bums on seats.
Some critics have knocked Horwood depriving proper actresses of a living but I don’t remember much fuss when Paul O’Grady’s drag creation Lily Savage took over from Miss Joseph at the Victoria Palace in 1999. Besides, he’s not just a bitch, he can sing and dance up a storm.
But enough about him. The show’s the thing and it is indeed magical, one of the very few we oldies can take our grandchildren to and secretly get even more pleasure from than they do.
Nobody who reads the Musical Theatre Review site needs to be told what the highly-unlikely plot is about so we’ll skip over that and simply say that, unlike so many of today’s new musicals, Annie has a raft of infuriatingly catchy songs which stay hummable long after we’ve caught the train home.
‘Tomorrow’ is a wonderful-for-the-time creation from lyricist Martin Charnin as it gives hope to a USA financially wrecked by the hard-knock-life of the post-Wall Street crash era, ‘Maybe’ never stops touching the heart, and ‘Easy Street’ gives Horwood and fellow crooks Rooster and Lily (Jonny Fines and Djalenga Scott, both on the money) the opportunity to hoof it to their hearts’ content.
The lesser-known ‘NYC’ gets the full treatment in the best-choreographed (by Nick Winston) moments and Charles Strouse’s timelessly tuneful score never falters or sags.
Even the infuriatingly upbeat ‘You’re Never Fully Dressed Without A Smile’ is tolerable under Nikolai Foster’s cracking direction and the orchestrations of David Shrubsole and George Dyer.
Colin Richmond’s jigsaw set switches seamlessly from orphanage poverty to gold-plated Warbucks sumptuousness and there’s the a-a-a-h factor of a real-life dog – Annie’s adopted pooch is played by labradoodle Amber – to add to the cuteness of a show that’s not exactly short of it.
The dependable Alex Bourne is a fine Warbucks and Holly Dale Spencer adequate (no more) as his personal assistant Grace Farrell. But the final word has to go to Annie and her fellow orphans.
Isabella Pappas, who alternates with Madeleine Haynes and Sophia Pettit, is a simply tremendous Annie, which comes as no great surprise as she’s already been Olivier-nominated for The Nether (beaten by Angela Lansbury no less!).
And the Astoria troupe of six (two other teams play in rotation) are so totally adorable they deserve individual name checks. So take a bow, Nikoo Saeki, Scarlett Flannery, Kate Woodman, Mia Hope, Asha Banks and Scarlet Churchhouse. Talk about energy… I was exhausted just watching them!
Jeremy Chapman
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