It looks like there may be trouble ahead in the first tripping moments of this silver screen musical adaptation. Several performers slip and fall during the ensemble opening number – Puttin’ on the Ritz. The show is stopped, the stage mopped up (its wetness apparently caused by unexpected condensation), and then the show really does proceed to put on the ritz.
Adapted by Matthew White and Howard Jacques, its drama of mistaken identity faithfully follows the 1935 movie starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers but it has more Irving Berlin tunes, each more divine than the last. Phillip Attmore plays Jerry Travers, the avowed bachelor and Broadway star whose head is turned by the independently minded fashion model Dale Tremont (Lucy St Louis). She, in turn, mistakes him for the older, married Horace Hardwick (Clive Carter) and the whole thing plays out like an American Restoration drama but with added tap dance and swing.
It is ravishingly directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall, who was behind the winning 2021 revival of Cole Porter’s Anything Goes at the Barbican theatre in London.
The twinkly eyed Attmore brings sublime tap all the way through but especially in the titular Top Hat, White Tie and Tails, complete with an immaculate dancing ensemble. There is incredibly silky singing from St Louis in songs such as Wild About You and Better Luck Next Time, and the central couple have a natural chemistry on stage.
Meanwhile, Horace and his wife Madge (Sally Ann Triplett, very amusing) bring anti-marital comedy, some of it predictable but entertaining nonetheless. Horace’s British valet, Bates (James Clyde), who refers to himself in the royal “we”, is a dryly comic highlight, as is Italian fashion designer Alberto Beddini, hammily played by Alex Gibson-Giorgio.
It is a show that is extremely easy on the eye with gorgeous ostrich-feathered costumes (designed by Yvonne Milnes and Peter McKintosh) and a revolving art deco set (also designed by McKintosh) which gestures to the elegant opulence of the film. Some of the costumes honour the film too, especially Dale’s silk and feather dress during her duet with Jerry in Cheek to Cheek.
Choreography goes from natty, bouncing tap to smooth, floaty numbers, and the latter have a swirling, romantic quality while the ensemble give the illusion of a far larger chorus line. Like Crazy for You, which played at the same theatre in 2022, this show seems raring for a London transfer. It stretches on for too long, and is not quite as spectacular as that musical, but the whole thing oozes style and wit. Heaven.
