Kevin Clifton and Maisie Smith in Strictly Ballroom The Musical at the New Wimbledon Theatre, London. Picture: Ellie Kurttz
Strictly Ballroom The Musical continues at the New Wimbledon Theatre, London until 12 November 2022, then on tour until 15 July 2023.
Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩
What a shrewd marketing ploy it was to cast 2018 Strictly Come Dancing winner “Kevin from Grimsby” Clifton with 2020 Strictly finalist Maisie Smith and have this outrageously camp Strictly Ballroom revival directed by SCD’s grumpiest judge Craig Revel Horwood.
As Strictly has turned out to be such a long-running triumph for the BBC and continues to attract eye-watering viewing figures, there’s a ready-made audience for the first tour of Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom musical and what a visual treat awaits them at the 36 venues already announced right up to mid-July next year.
Originally a 1992 movie and a big hit at the time, then a moderately successful West End musical which ran for seven months in 2018, it’s a loud, vulgar, wildly OTT send-up of the cheesy, corrupt, squabbling, set-in-its-ways Australian ballroom dance scene of the 1980s and how a young rebel tries to bring it up to date.
Newcomer Scott Hastings wants to introduce new steps that horrify the traditionalists and when he loses his dance partner shortly before a big national competition he stuns the bigwigs by bringing in a young novice, shy Fran, to partner him.
Fran comes from a deeply religious Spanish flamenco-dance family. It’s a culture clash and at first her parents are deeply disapproving. He teaches her the new moves but not before father Rico show him how the real pasodoble should look.
It is this wonderfully-staged long scene at the end of Act I that takes Strictly Ballroom to a different level with the magnificent Jose Agudo taking command of the stage with a breathtaking paso that has everybody cheering, his performance orchestrated by wise words from mother Abuela (Karen Mann, excellent).
For that scene alone it’s worth buying a ticket and that’s not to downgrade the efforts of the two leads Clifton and Smith. On top of her Strictly followers, young Maisie has a host of fans from her long stint as Tiffany in EastEnders. Now she has a few thousand more after making her musical theatre debut a winning one.
As a 19-year-old she reached the 2020 Strictly final with partner Gorka Marquez before losing out to comedian Bill Bailey so we knew Maisie could dance but she has a pretty singing voice too as we see in her gorgeous ‘Beautiful Surprise’ duet with Clifton, himself revealing a pleasing vocal range and improving acting skills.
But it is for Clifton’s dancing that everybody signs up and the man who won Strictly with Stacey Dooley (then won her heart) doesn’t let them down. A little more chemistry between him and Smith would not go amiss but that’s up to the director.
Given full licence to overact to their hearts’ content, the supporting cast needs no second bidding. Nikki Belsher is so apoplectic as mother Shirley she is hard to understand at times but Mark Sangster (Doug), Gary Davis (Barry) and Quinn Patrick (Les) pitch it about right with their entrenched caricatures.
They all got their share of laughs from a lively script by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce not short of four-letter words or innuendo while never losing sight of the cheeky fun and the sheer joy of the dancing.
The show’s 21 numbers, a mix of the familiar (Cyndi Lauper’s ‘Time After Time’, ‘Love is in the Air’, ‘Happy Feet’ and ‘Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps’) with the new, get the full treatment from the six-strong band under MD Dustin Conrad. Among all the upbeat ensemble numbers, likeable ballads worth hearing again provide a welcome change of pace in this riot of colour, glitz and energy. Co-choreographers Revel Horwood and Jason Gilkison must have had a field day.
Watching plenty of happy feet jigging down a very damp Wimbledon high street after this feel-good show temporarily took the audience away from the grim reality of rising prices and trying to make ends meet.
A good night out? Definitely. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G? Not quite, Craig, but certainly an 8, even from an old meanie like you.
Jeremy Chapman
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