Hello, Dolly! opened on Broadway in 1964, and was such a success for star, Carol Channing and company, that it held the record for most Tony Awards for an impressive 37 years. The film version with Barbara Streisand achieved mixed financial success but also garnered three Academy Awards.
The musical, based on a farce by Thornton Wilder, follows the travails Dolly Gallagher Levi, a matchmaker and all round busybody in 1890’s New York. Dolly, herself a widow, has her own sights set on marrying the miserly “semi-millionaire” Horace Vandergelder, wonderfully played by Andy Nyman.
While director Dominic Cooke’s production is lively and splendid, he deftly uncovers the darker side of Dolly’s character within the show’s froth-light plot. But it is the talents of the show’s incomparable leading lady, Imelda Staunton, that adds depth as well as pizzaz to what would be merely a fun and charming evening. Staunton deftly commands the Palladium stage, and reveals the heartache that sits alongside the pluck of a bereaved widow seeking to re-engage with life. Dolly’s stock-in-trade is her predilection to meddle in matrimonial matters, and perhaps to earn a buck or two along the way. She schemes for herself, while also plotting on behalf of Vandergelder’s niece, as well as his two inexperienced clerks, Cornelius and Barnaby (Harry Hemple and Tyrone Huntley) who spend a stolen evening in New York yearning to fall in love.
The set uses large cut-outs and projections of New York buildings and cityscapes – which occasionally feel a bit flat – that scroll along the back wall with a moving platform centre stage for the actors to stride across or ‘ride’. The costumes, also by Rae Smith, are a joy – bright pastels abound, with plenty of Americana tropes and characters colourfully depicted.
Staunton shines, capturing the audience right from the opening moment. She is a virtuoso performer with a wide range, whether portraying the late Queen in the TV mega-hit, The Crown, or a working class wife and mother in Mike Leigh’s Vera Drake. The role of Dolly is less of a vocal challenge than was her Gypsy performance, Staunton can shimmy and shake with razzamatazz during any one of her show-stopping song and dance numbers. Staunton can deliver a one-line quip as deftly as any stand-up comedian, or reveal the pathos of Dolly’s grief when she almost whispers the ballad, “Love, Look in My Window”. This reviewer was only twelve when he saw the Carol Channing Dolly, and while memory fades, the original production certainly didn’t showcase the depths of character that Staunton brings to the role.
The New York accents can sometime feel a tad overdone, and the storyline a bit too thin, but no matter, just wait for the musical numbers. The choreography by Bill Deamer is thoroughly delightful, and the male dance corps, in particular, spin and kick their socks off with rousing impact and applause at the end of each number.
To 14 September 2024
Running time: 2 hours, plus 20 minute interval.
Book: Michael Stewart
Music and Lyrics: Jerry Herman
Director: Dominic Cooke
Set and Costume Design: Rae Smith
Choreographer: Bill Deamer
Lighting Designer: Jon Clarke
Cast includes: Imelda Staunton; Andy Nyman; Jenna Russell; Tyrone Huntley; Harry Hepple; Emily Lane
Photo credit: Manuel Harlan