Blonde was presented by Kristian Thomas Company.
Star rating: three stars ★ ★ ★ ✩ ✩
This short (80 minutes including interval) musical theatre biopic tells the story of the troubled, misunderstood Marilyn Monroe.
We’re in the (empty) Duchess Theatre in the East Midlands where choreographer Kristian Cunningham makes neat use of the stage and the area around the three-piece band (MD Tom Bond) so that dancers are often in front of the band as well as behind it. The driving force for this may have been social distancing but it’s theatrically effective.
Marilyn Monroe is like Winston Churchill or Frankie Howerd. Her style was so distinctive that she’s very recognisably captured.
Verity Power looks the part – dressed to suggest a bosomy hourglass figure – and gets exactly the right blend of childlike, disingenuous sexuality and damaged, anguished woman.
Power commands the stage but her vocals don’t quite match those of Anna Bond who plays Norma Jeane, the young Marilyn, and brings us exquisite long, haunting phrasing.
The two are ably supported by a small ensemble including Finlay Paul as the photographer George Gifford and Tom Hopcraft (who also directs) as Jimmy Dougherty.
Adam Howell and Paul Hurt’s sympathetic show, which was new to me, conveys a strong sense of a lost woman looking for a purpose in life and a way of being recognised for herself. She is desperate to rise above the dumb-blonde-who-can’t-act image but of course she doesn’t make good decisions.
The play on the word “late” at the beginning and end is poignant too. There’s a joke about her unpunctuality but of course this is a show about the life of the late Marilyn Monroe who died from a drug overdose when she was only 36.
The Kristian Thomas Company’s production of Blonde is thoughtful and pretty convincing – with some enjoyable performances.
Susan Elkin
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