Judy: The Songbook of Judy Garland

✭✭✭✩✩    Luft for life

Playhouse, Edinburgh: Fri 9 – Sat 10 May 2015

When you’re Lorna Luft, the shadow of Judy Garland is inescapable. The Hollywood legend introduced her daughter to the world in a touching segment on her TV show, singing a new song, Lorna, to her.

As she grew up, Luft developed a mean pair of pipes herself and she’s gone on to make her living singing and acting around the world. And while she’s never traded on her mother’s name, she’s going to want to sing her best-known songs occasionally, the songs the public wants to hear.

Lorna Luft and The Boyfriends – Luke Field Wright, Andrew Hamshire, Sam Stanley, Alec Mann. Photo: publicity

So Edinburgh Playhouse hosts Judy, The Songbook of Judy Garland, before it sets off round the UK, in which a couple of dozen tunes associated with the star are performed, and occasionally reinvented, by Luft and friends.

Said friends include West End star Louise Dearman, whose rich voice more than does her songs justice, and Darren Bennett (no, not THAT one, Strictly fans), a theatre veteran with a mile-wide grin and a mean way with a dance step.

There’s also former Brookside star and Dancing on Ice winner Ray Quinn, who tries hard but isn’t quite up there with the rest of the cast when it comes to singing for the theatre – he gives us Putting on the Ritz in several keys, none of which seem the right one. His dancing is better, but he still seems underpowered given his billing.

Rachel Stanley and Georgina Hagen are likeable presences and can certainly sell a song, while Alexander Evans and Jeff Smyth give strong support, especially when Dearman leads The Trolley Song and On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe. The harmonies courtesy of musical director Colin R Freeman really are stupendous, recalling the heyday of the MGM Studio Chorus.

And dancers the Boyfriends provide Hollywood-style pizazz, circling the singers amiably and energetically. There’s some terrific tap on display, along with plenty of slinky moves, thanks to choreographers Douglas Mills and Richard Roe (tap).

Luft is luminous

And if you think it’s taken a while for me to get back to Luft, that reflects my quibble with this show – it’s about a dozen numbers in before the main attraction shows up, and you can feel the impatience. Sure, the featured players provide value for money, and the clips from Garland’s movies projected on Colin Rozée’s superb stage set bring back the memories, but this is sold as a Lorna Luft tribute to her mother.

Ray Quinn and Louise Dearman. Photo: Publicity

When she does finally emerge, the show comes alive. Luft is luminous, a powerful presence every bit as skilled with a song as Garland. She proves this immediately with a hypnotic Come Rain or Come Shine, followed by a pairing of Born in a Trunk and Rockabye Your Baby, and Act One closer Swanee.

The second half has a lot more Luft and is all the better for it – when she’s not on stage, singing and sharing stories, the Judy Garland Songbook remains entertaining but the magic isn’t there. So while Dearman’s Stormy Weather is heartbreaking; Hagen’s Johnny One-Note leaves you wanting more; and Dearman and Bennett’s But Not For Me/Embraceable You is gorgeous – they all lack the sheer star power Luft brings.

Luft belts out Chicago with electrifying gusto and total control, while a medley with Dearman echoing an iconic TV encounter between Garland and Barbra Streisand is sheer delight.

But it’s The Man That Got Away that provides the evening’s most memorable moment. Luft generally doesn’t try to sound like her mother, because there’s no need – she owns her talent. But in this, for once, she truly channels Garland, allowing the spirit of her mother to inform voice and delivery: the intonation, tone, phrasing, it’s like having the icon back.

The close of the show sees Luft and her ensemble with backs to the audience, staring at clips of Garland as a recording of Over the Rainbow fills the theatre. The melodic clarity of Garland singing that lovely standard never fails to thrill, but as a finale to a piece of live theatre, it disappoints.

With this much talent available to directors Christopher Manoe and David King, there should be a humdinger of a closing number. Given the cast’s skill with harmonies, a choral interpretation of Over the Rainbow would likely be just the ticket – an interpretation to complement, rather than compete with, Garland’s unassailable version.

As it is, you leave the theatre appreciating once more the remarkable woman that was Judy Garland, but wanting to hear more from her younger daughter. If Judy was watching Lorna Luft, you can bet she’d be very proud.

Running time: 2 hours 20 mins (including interval)
Edinburgh Playhouse, Greenside Place, EH1 3AA
Friday 8, Saturday 9 May 2015
Evenings: 7.30pm; Saturday matinee: 2.30pm
Tickets and information from: http://www.atgtickets.com/shows/judy-the-judy-garland-story/edinburgh-playhouse/

ENDS

Tags: Alexander Evans, Darren Bennett, Georgina Hagen, Jeff Smyth, Judy - The Songbook of Judy Garland, Judy Garland, Lorna Luft, Louise Dearman, Martin Gray, Musicals, Playhouse, Rachel Stanley, Ray Quinn, Review