Trafalgar Entertainment’s partnership with the Barbican Centre was responsible for one of the biggest musical hits of the decade so far – with their spectacular revival of Cole Porter’s Anything Goes receiving two record-breaking London seasons and a UK Tour. The company have returned to the Porter canon for this summer’s blockbuster production – a revival of the tunesmith’s 1948 Broadway musical Kiss Me, Kate, written with husband-and-wife team Sam and Bella Spewack.

This new production is heavy on star wattage, with posters all over London boasting the presence of Broadway star Stephanie J. Block (in her London debut) alongside Adrian Dunbar (known to TV viewers as Ted Hastings in the BBC’s Line of Duty). Even in the supporting roles, we’re treated to high-profile performers Charlie Stemp, Nigel Lindsay and Peter Davison.

Kiss Me, Kate was the brainchild of producer Arnold Saint-Subber who, as a young man, had worked on the infamous 1935 production of William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, starring the husband-and-wife acting team Alfred Lunt and Lynne Fontanne. The Lunt-Fontannes marital problems was causing more drama offstage than on, and Saint-Subber saw great potential for a musical. Thus, Alfred Lunt becomes Fred Graham, and Lynne Fontanne Lilli Vanessi, whose marriage is over, and careers are on the down. Graham has produced and is starring in a production of “The Shrew”, and thinks that casting Vanessi for her star wattage (she has had a small amount of Hollywood success since their marriage) will help give the production the box office excitement and positive reviews it needs to transfer to Broadway. We are witness to the offstage mishaps of the pair and the onstage chaos of the production as proceedings are barely held together, alongside supporting players Bill Calhoun (a lothario and gambler), Lois Lane (Fred’s bit-on-the-side promoted above her station to Shakespearean actor), Harrison Howell (Lilli’s militaristic fiancé) and the gangsters (sent by their boss to retrieve an IOU signed by Calhoun in Graham’s name).

Block justifies her place amongst the Broadway elite with her thrilling and glamorous turn as star Lilli Vanessi. Her chemistry with Dunbar as her ex-husband and stage counterpart sizzles, as
we’re treated to will-they-won’t-they farce of epic proportions, in which Block nails every comic beat. If this weren’t enough, add in her sublime voice, and we’re treated to some of the finest singing you’ll hear in London right now. From the torch ballad of “So In Love”, the comic operetta of “Wunderbar” and the coloratura of the title song, Block nails it all, and is constantly in command of the stage and her audience.

Charlie Stemp, hot off his success in last season’s revival of Crazy For You, lends his talents to another comic song-and-dance man, a role which is so much in Stemp’s wheelhouse, one can’t help but feel him slightly overqualified. It would be nice for producers to find something more meaty and dramatic for him to take on in the future. Georgina Onourah, a hit in last season’s The Wizard of Oz at the London Palladium, brings comedy and vocal chops to the role of Lois Lane, even if her comedy is a little broad, and her vocals a little anachronistic for these ears – leaving a little to be desired.

Hammed Animashaun and the aforementioned Nigel Lindsay leave nothing to be desired in their turns as the gangsters-turned-Shakespeareans, with every modicum of comedy wrung out of the script and their physicality. The audience welcomed their presence onstage, and was driven almost maniacal in their act two showstopper “Brush Up Your Shakespeare”, which earned several encores.

The production succeeds, however, because of the effortless charm and star quality of its leading man, Adrian Dunbar. Dunbar’s casting as famous-actor-playing Shakespeare almost adds another meta level, as there can’t have been many in the Barbican audience who weren’t already aware of Dunbar’s work. Therefore, we enter into a sort-of shorthand relationship with Dunbar. Every character in the story revolves around his Fred Graham, and we, his audience, are part of that circle. We love to see him succeed, we love to see him get his just desserts, and we love to see his sensitive side – realising his true love for his ex-wife in a beautiful reprise of “So In Love” in act two. Make no mistake, Dunbar can certainly sing. Some purists may find his vocal styling too much of a departure from previous actors with big voices to have played the role (Brian Stokes Mitchell, Alex Bourne, Will Chase and the original, Alfred Drake), but Dunbar brings something unique and special to the character, and the production quite simply wouldn’t work without him.

The production is overseen by high-profile Broadway director Bartlett Sher, the man whom the New York Times called “one of the most original and exciting directors”, famous for his relationship with Lincoln Center Theater in New York, where he has been Resident Director for nearly twenty years. This partnership has borne critical and commercial theatrical fruit, including revivals of Lerner and Loewe’s My Fair Lady and Rodgers & Hammerstein’s The King and I and South Pacific, all of which received London transfers (the latter in this very theatre in 2011). Sher has reunited with celebrated costume designer Catherine Zuber for this production, and the result is a stunning array of costumes embodying the different worlds of the piece – the early 20th century Shakespeare show-within-a-show, the every day workers costumes of the backstage environs and, most spectacularly, a parade of stunning gowns worn by leading lady Block.

Elsewhere, the orchestra (under the baton of Anything Goes musical director Steve Ridley) are producing glorious sounds – at times jazzy and spiky (as Anthony Van Laast’s choreography for numbers like “Too Darn Hot” demands), at times lyrical and luscious (as a voice like Stephanie J. Block’s demands), and there is much interaction throughout the evening between the pit and the stage.

This is a dazzling revival of a Broadway classic, and it deserves a healthy run in London, perhaps a UK Tour, and perhaps even a transfer to Sher’s home patch – Broadway?

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