Marie Clark Musical Theate. The Arts Theatre. 24 May 2013
Marie Clark’s board have made a sound choice with their selection of first time director, Ben Stefanoff and first time choreographer, Ali Walsh, along with Emma Knights to head up the team producing How to Succeed. The cast includes one of the strongest male ensembles I have seen in amateur theatre for a long time. In fact, the overall balance of the ensemble and lead players across the board should be commended. What Stefanoff has managed to achieve is a true ensemble production where no one player stands out, good or bad, above the whole.
In the lead role J. Pierrepont Finch, Buddy Dawson takes command of the stage and is on from start to finish. His Finch is wholesome, endearing and ambitious. Dawson moves wonderfully and sings even better. It would have been nice to see some more of the sinister and conniving side of Finch so his ascension seemed less coincidental – but the characterisation was enjoyable nonetheless.
Rachel Da Graca Costa played Finch’s love interest, Rosemary. Da Graca Costa moved very well, and managed to incorporate a lot of dancing whilst she sang – not an easy feat. Her singing voice is very pretty and would have benefited from some more powerful moments to give her songs even more light and shade.
The nephew of business executive J. B. Biggley, played charmingly by Max Rayner, is Bud Frump. Chris Daniels plays Frump with panache and his characterisation is wonderfully whiny and perfectly annoying without going over the top. Kristen Stefanoff and Rachel Dow round out the cast of main characters as Smitty and Hedy LarRue, both holding their respective parts up to the cast’s high standard.
Highlight numbers came from the males with ‘Company Way’ and ‘Brotherhood of Man’, particularly from Shay Aitken as Mr Twimble. Both songs also included some well executed and designed choreography which demonstrated the fine attention to detail that Walsh has applied to the whole production.
The set looked okay and was functional. There were a few mishaps on opening night with positioning and timing of the rolling parts. The use of a lift door was clever, but got the better of the cast on a few occasions where they could still be seen scampering off stage when the doors were re-opened. A few key set pieces were very average and needed more thought such as Biggley’s desk, lacking the opulence that the team were going for it really stood out like a sore thumb.
The orchestra, under musical director Emma Knights, was quite good. They took a little while to warm up in the overture, but soon hit their straps. Sound operation by Tim Freedman was of a usual high standard; missed queues will be captured as the run progresses.
The show itself is probably a little tired, but this team have managed to give it a lot of life. I shall be looking forward to seeing much more from Stefanoff and Walsh in the future – if How to Succeed is anything to go by, then the future is bright.
Paul Rodda
When: 24 May to 1 Jun
Where: The Arts Theatre
Bookings: marieclark.asn.au
