Oliver Hume and Stuart Horobin in Jekyll & Hyde at the Cockpit Theatre, London
Jekyll & Hyde continues at the Cockpit Theatre, London until 6 February.
Star rating: two stars ★ ★ ✩ ✩ ✩
The Cockpit in Marylebone plays host to a musical adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, from Birmingham’s Blue Orange Theatre, which despite a sumptuous setting and alluring premise, falls fatally short of its promises.
Adapting or retelling a classic work for modern theatre is tough business. It’s more than a question of finding an angle, it demands that you recognise the purpose in its original sculpture. Stevenson’s Jekyll & Hyde is set in a time when the popular moral doctrine spoke of repression of the darker self, and the abundant fear of scientific momentum. Shifting the time frame can work, and the subversive smokescreen of the 1930s jazz era almost does in this situation, but only if you dig out the parts of society racked by the same fears, and there isn’t a strong enough indication of this in Eric Gracey’s script.
The thrill for any audience is anticipating the horror, not knowing when the underlying danger will erupt into destruction. This retelling lacks that primal suspense in the narrative which should keep us on the edge of our seats, and the performances feel like they suffer the same frustration. It also doesn’t have the depth of moral investigation that any gothic horror should demand.
Mark Webster must be commended for his beautiful set design in what could be a tricky space for a cast of under six. An Art Deco thrust stage glitters in its prime, dropped waists and sensual fabrics are in abundance, it’s undeniable that for better or worse, the action is drenched in the 1930s cabaret scene, and it’s intoxicating.
Webster’s direction, however, lacks presence. Despite some formidable casting, and an atmospheric set, little has been done to combat the flaws in the script, or the habitual mannerisms of certain members of the cast. The stage combat throughout is hesitant and without passion or momentum. The mime is odd, and out of place (can we please relegate the miming of doors and liquids to the artisan, abstract, or absolute necessity?).
Oliver Hume, as Jekyll, gives a heartfelt performance, but the nuance has not been explored fully, and there is no danger burning at the core of it. His grizzled, half-head prosthetic by ‘Creature Encounter’ is truly gruesome, but unexplained and restrictive.
One ray of light in this production of Jekyll & Hyde is Charlotte Szabo’s performance as Rose. Seizing control of the show with a sultry and silken-voiced rendition of Joseph McCoy’s ‘Why Don’t You Do Right?’, she sends even the most puritanical of the audience into a hot flush, and proceeds to take our hearts again and again throughout her musical moments. Szabo, and Pete Lee’s steamy piano accompaniments, reward our attention a hundredfold.
Stuart Horobin also spins through an impressive wheel of characters, each as varied as the next – though he does occasionally fall into a repetitive tune in his dialogue.
It’s a shame that there hasn’t been more attention paid to the erratic beats of the jazz age and how they could further intertwine with the story of an unpredictable moral struggle – you are left feeling like there’s a lot more that could have been developed from this concept, especially in terms of the music.
This play is nevertheless a seductive premise, which, this time, lacks ingenuity, from a company with interesting artistic vision, that has yet to find its voice.
Aura Simon
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