Eric Comstock and Barbara Fasano – Crazy Coqs

Barbara Fasano and Eric Comstock pay homage to New York at the Crazy Coqs, London

Helluva Town: A New York Soundtrack – Eric Comstock and Barbara Fasano at the Crazy Coqs, London.

It was most inconsiderate of Andy Murray to drag out his quarter-final until 7.20pm on Wednesday as nobody was going to leave their sofa or Wimbledon seat until the final point had been won, and that was surely the reason why the Crazy Coqs was less than half full for the New York husband-and-wife team of Eric Comstock and Barbara Fasano paying a 22-song homage to their wonderful, buzzy, overcrowded and loud city.

Married nine years, they are not quite the Posh and Becks of the Big Apple’s cabaret society, but their chemistry and warmth light up the evening and not always with the songs you would have expected.

My companion lamented the absence of such anthems as ‘New York, New York’ – neither the Kander and Ebb nor the Bernstein/Comden/Green On the Town version – and Rodgers and Hart’s Manhattan, but maybe it was a conscious decision not to invite comparison with Sinatra, Minnelli or Ella Fitzgerald.

The Great American Songbook still dominated the set but we also got some surprises: the Bacharach/David hit for Dionne Warwick ‘I’ll Never Fall in Love Again’ at least came from a 1968 Broadway musical, Promises, Promises, and Paul Simon’s ‘Old Friends’ was permissible because the composer is a New Yorker through and through (although born just outside the state in Newark), but the connection of ‘Marcie’ by Canadian singer/songwriter Joni Mitchell was too subtle for some us, although the Hudson River does get a mention.

The secret of a successful cabaret act depends on tailoring the product to the audience and Fasano, glamorous in hair-matching black, got off on the right note by “London-ising” the ageless lyrics of ‘How About You?’ (from the 1941 film Babes On Broadway).

We had “Boris Johnson’s looks give me a thrill” replacing the Burton Lane/Ralph Freed original ‘Frankin’ and “Paul Merton’s jokes” standing in for ‘Jack Benny’ which got everybody on-side straight away.

‘I Cannot Hear The City’ was a striking ballad Marvin Hamlisch and Craig Carnelia wrote for the 2002 musical version of the Tony Curtis/Burt Lancaster movie Sweet Smell of Success and standards such as Frank Loesser’s ‘My Time of Day’ and Arlen and Mercer’s ‘My Shining Hour’ always hold their appeal, although I felt there was at least one ballad too many.

Maybe Fasano tried TOO hard to impress on her London debut by over-dramatising some of them with gestures more suited to a bigger stage than the intimate Crazy Coqs room.

The Comstock approach, all conversational laidback charm, worked better. Nobody would confuse his light tenor with Pavarotti, but he more than made up for lack of vocal fireworks with superb timing, much like another New York visitor to London, Steve Ross, does and, like Ross, his touch on the piano, jazz influenced at times, was a total joy.

The show worked best on the funny songs. ‘She’s a Latin From Manhattan’ and ‘The Hamptons’ – “where the literati glitter and the glitterati litter” – were a hoot and the star turns of a pleasant 75 minutes that ended with a touchy-feely ‘Two Sleepy People’ that typified the romance of a city that never sleeps. Would that we could say the same about London where getting home after midnight for out-of-towners can be a nightmare.

Jeremy Chapman