Charlie Merriman and Ellie Nunn in Desperate Measure at the Jermyn Street Theatre, London. Picture: Roy Tan
Desperate Measures continues at the Jermyn Street Theatre until 20 December.
Star rating: one star ★ ✩ ✩ ✩ ✩
Some musical theatre composers like to set challenges for themselves, it seems. Looking for comedic material to adapt? Choose one of Shakespeare’s ‘problem plays’ that, while listed as a comedy, is altogether darker in tone. Not hard enough for you? Transpose the setting to London in the Swinging Sixties, and concoct a plot by which the prime minister voluntarily cedes control of his government to a Bible-thumping moral crusader who reinstates the death penalty for immoral acts. Still looking for a challenge? Cast all the roles, including those of old men, with actors who look as if they’ve only just graduated from drama school, and who sound as if there was no vocal section to the audition process.
That, in a nutshell, is an indication of the scale of the self-inflicted problems that Robin Kingsland and Chris Barton have set themselves with their new musical, Desperate Measures, based on Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure. A great book and superb music could help elevate a show beyond such limitations, leading it to succeed despite everything. This is not such a show.
The rearranged story sees PM Douglas Dukes take a leave of absence, appointing the rabidly zealous Simon Di Angelo (Charlie Merriman) to take charge in his place. When pop singer Milo gets his fiancée pregnant out of wedlock, his novice nun sister Isobel takes leave of her holy orders to campaign for his release – only for Di Angelo to offer her a deal: if she sleeps with him, he will spare her brother.
A scene from Desperate Measures. Picture: Roy Tan
Such absurdity could potentially work if it were played as a satire for our times, while acknowledging its own ridiculous premise. And to his credit, Merriman very much plays it in this vein. His character’s hypocrisy, his very immoral approach to preaching morality, is delivered with just the right level of unctuous charm. Unfortunately, neither Barton’s direction nor Kingsland’s book seem to have got the message, lurching uneasily from attempts at end-of-pier farce to hand-wringing drama and back throughout. The show’s other lead, Ellie Nunn as Isobel, plays the character very much as an earnest, straight role, meaning that her otherwise impressive performance completely fails to mesh with anyone else.
Nunn does get the best song of the piece, Act II’s ‘I Want to Pray’, in which her character begins to question her faith and the quandary it has led her into. Unfortunately her voice breaks into tears far too early, rather quashing any chance of Barton’s music really engaging with the audience. And then the full ensemble enters, ruining the moment completely.
And this is a recurring theme throughout – each of Barton and Kingsland’s songs are overworked, trying to accomplish too much and in multiple styles. And then, just as one song finishes and there is a sense of momentum finally starting up, a series of leadenly scripted scenes and dodgy performances kill any chance of that.
Of the ensemble, only Emily Rose-Hurdiss and Angharad George-Carey manage to emerge with any sense of dignity, each creating multiple roles that are distinct and have depth found from somewhere other than the script. Elsewhere, the ensemble does not manage so well. When the campaigning vicar turns out to have been the prime minister all along, hiding behind a dog collar and a dodgy moustache, at least he has an excuse for making the two roles indistinguishable.
The press release describes Desperate Measures as the Jermyn Street Theatre’s Christmas show. If you’re looking for complex moral and theological questions this festive season, you’re probably better off with the John Lewis advert.
Scott Matthewman
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