Living With Sin continues at theSpace @ Niddry Street until 20 August 2022 and theSpace @ Surgeon’s Hall from 22-27 August 2022.
Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
The show opens to a solitary girl onstage, holding an urn, and she speaks about her relationship with her grandmother. This is Cece (Lauren Lopez) – she speaks directly to members of the audience in the warmest tones, involving everyone in the room from the get-go. She is joined by seven other characters in a detailed and deftly directed opening number complete with Fosse-esque choreography. Over the applause, the woman next to me whispered, “Wow! I didn’t expect that!” Wow is indeed the word – a very strong opening.
These seven other characters are more commonly known as the seven deadly sins and now that Elsie (the grandmother) has died and left Cece her house, she also inherits the company of the ‘sins’. Every ‘sin’ has a nickname to make them a bit more personal and they dish up plenty of advice for Cece to follow.
It’s difficult to tell how much time passes between the interactions, but Cece embraces her new hedonistic approach to life whole-heartedly. Each interaction is laced with music and song, some more successfully than others, but strong character performances and appearance help with the variety. A highlight is where Elsie’s music box is given the words of the song from Cece’s childhood and it’s accompanied by a beautifully touching ballet sequence.
It may be that some of the voices had not been warmed up quite well enough to sustain the whole performance, or simply Fringe ‘flu’ striking early, but this ought to be addressed to prevent damage to tired vocal cords! The music and lyrics deserve to be well-served and it’s likely this will improve across the run.
Bravo, Cambridge University Musical Theatre Society – another delight of a show!
Fiona Orr
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