Blues in the Night – Kiln Theatre

Gemma Sutton and Sharon D Clarke in Blues in the Night at the Kiln Theatre, London. Picture: Matt Humphrey

Blues in the Night continues at the Kiln Theatre, London – until 7 September 2019.

Star rating: five stars ★★★★★

There is much about Blues in the Night to remind one of Ain’t Misbehavin’, the Fats Waller musical revue that recently ran at the Southwark Playhouse. Both revolve around songs of Depression-era America, a time when the blues music of the Deep South was combining with the Vaudevillian history of the North.

But the mood is very different: while Ain’t Misbehavin’ was a gilt-edged marvel of optimism, tinged with a little sadness here and there, Blues in the Night is just the opposite. The piece, originally devised and directed in 1980 by Sheldon Epps, is staged in a rundown hotel in 1930s Chicago. In their separate, rundown hotel rooms sit three women: Gemma Sutton as The Girl, an ingenue looking for a good time and taking to the bottle when it eludes her; Debbie Kurup’s The Woman, who found her good time, and now mourns it loss.

And then there is The Lady.

A former Vaudeville showgirl, Sharon D Clarke’s character carries decades of pain and regret with her, the emotions as physical as the costumes and scrap books that litter her small corner of designer Robert Jones’ set. At times she seems to have made peace with her life – but nobody ever does, really. And that pain is personified in The Man (Clive Rowe) – an habitué of the hotel’s jazz club downstairs, and who represents the cause (he would say, the remedy) of all the women’s problems.

This framing structure that Epps gave his revue seems, at first, to be a simple way of divvying up songs from the canon: give the older songs to The Lady, the more optimistic numbers to The Girl, let The Woman have a smattering of both and allow The Man to sing from the male perspective occasionally.

But Susie McKenna’s direction gives the production a coherence and cogency that elevates proceedings. While there is no real narrative to speak of, she and the cast work to give a consistency and through line to each character. Clarke and Rowe’s relationship particularly benefits from this staging, each showing a respectful disdain for the other. After Clarke belts out a particularly powerful ballad, Rowe’s Man turns the mood around on a dime with a sarcastic slow hand clap; when he gives a powerful performance, she leans into the audience and makes it clear she can’t stand the man – “but”, she confides reluctantly, “he sure can sing”.

The camaraderie extends even more successfully between the three women, eventually. First, we get some storming solo numbers, including a rendition of ‘Stompin’ at the Savoy’ by Kurup which starts as a mournful reminiscence, progresses into an uptempo stomp, before fading back into downbeat nostalgia.

But this is Clarke’s night. Her Lady is at her best when paired with songs written by Bessie Smith, nowhere more apparent than a powerful rendition of ‘Wasted Life Blues’. But she can also let her hair down and revel in the show’s lighter numbers, particularly the delightfully innuendo-laden ‘Kitchen Man’, whose perpetual references to handling meat and vegetables barely reach for the single entendre, let alone any doubles.

Backing dancers Aston New and Joseph Poulton are criminally underused, largely disappearing into the background midway through Act I and not reappearing until the show’s barnstorming curtain call. But while Frank Thompson’s choreography is impressive, it is perhaps unnecessary and might detract from the vocal performances on display here. Backed by musical director Mark Dickman on piano and his four-piece band, the songs – and the women they immortalise – are the stars.

And there is none more starry than Sharon D Clarke, returning to the role of The Lady she once understudied at an inappropriately young age. But although the role is now age-appropriate, there is one line that speaks volumes. “I ain’t gettin’ older,” says The Lady. “I’m gettin’ better.”

And this glorious production shows that the same is true for Clarke, too.

Scott Matthewman