ECHO REVIEW OF OLIVER TWIST, PRESENTED BY THALIANS
ANY urges to sing-along with Oliver Twist must be resisted. Thalians' production of one of the world's best-known tales is not Oliver! For sure, Oliver! is a great musical. But just for once, it is refreshing to be able to enjoy one of the world's best-known classic tales without the songs to get in the way.
Director (and adapter) Penny Betteridge has done us all a great service by reverting to the original Charles Dickens novel of 1839. While the magic storytelling qualities and immortal characters are all there on stage, the Thalians' production also captures the much tougher mood of the book, and its driving sense of social injustice.
This production also benefits from another key asset, a confident and polished group of child actors drawn from local drama schools. In particular, Jake Marks in the title role manages to capture both the frailty and the true grit of the young Oliver. But the girls and boys playing the workhouse children are also an impressive bunch, and in particular they show an early grasp of the art of ensemble playing.
Among the adults, Tom King (no relation to the Echo theatre critic) stands out in the role of Mr Bumble, the overbearing beadle and overseer of the workhouse where the orphan Oliver makes his famous demand for “more”. The scenes between Bumble and Gill Bernie as the widow Mrs Corney, who becomes his wife and the bane of his existence, are the comic highpoint of this production.
Paul Macklin is everyone's idea of the villainous thug Bill Sikes, and Lucy Betteridge as Nancy – fiction's first portrayal of a tart-with-a-heart – stands alongside the best and most convincing Nancies that I have seen. Scott Whatley as Monks, the furtive man of mystery, turns a rather two-dimensional character into a believably nasty piece of work.
The one slightly jarring note comes from Mike Betteridge in the role of Fagin, the gangmaster who takes Oliver under his wicked wing and teaches him the art of pick-pocketing. Betteridge is a fine actor with many memorable performances under his belt, but I found his approach to Fagin oddly low-key and subdued. This is a charactr who should dominate proceedings, but he comes on like a bit-part player. What has happened to Fagin's exuberant eloquence and villainous charisma?
Still, there is exuberance to spare in other aspects of this production, which, while it may dispense with the songs, still has no difficulty in capturing the richness and warmth of Dickens's vision, and the vitality of early Victorian London.
Oliver Twist
Towngate Theatre (Mirren Studio), Basildon
Nightly at 7.30pm until Sat Nov 12
Box office: 01268 465465