REVIEW: THE CHER SHOW (UK Tour) @ Manchester Opera House

 

Listen up bitches. Pop stars don't come much more iconic than Cher. From her first hit in 1965,  she is still churning out music which is being snapped up by multi-generational buyers nearly six decades later.  It was perhaps inevitable that her life and music catalogue would make it to the musical theatre stage.  And this it did in 2018 when The Cher Show opened on Broadway amid much publicity.   It has taken a little while to cross the Atlantic but now a brand new revised UK production has set off on tour bringing the style icon's story to stages across the land.

The awkward teenager Sherilyn Sarkisian, from mixed race parents, has been the subject of racial predjudice and harrassment but from these humble beginnings and encouraged by her forthright mother she discovered an unusual and powerful singing voice. Meeting Sonny Bono when she was just 16 was the turning point.  Sonny was an upcoming  song writer and producer - being mentored by Phil Spector - and the first song Cher ever sang on was background vocals to The Ronettes' 'Be My Baby' in 1963.

To tell her meteoric rise to fame the author Rick Elice has brought in three actresses to portray Cher at different stages of her life.  Millie O'Connell (Babe),  Danielle Steers (Lady) and Debbie Kurup (Star).  All three ladies work hard to bring out the distinctive Cher mannersims and low vocal style.  O'Connell still perhaps reminds me more of her Maureen in Rent than Cher at times, but she is a great performer and her natural charisma carries her through.  Steers and Kurup get to portray the more familiar rock goddess and they both nail it,  voices to die for and looking fabulous.  All three have 'turned back time' to give us a heavy flavour of the icon.

For every Cher there has to be a Sonny,  and here the production is blessed with the amazing Lucas Rush who nails Sonny in his younger years,  bringing out Bono's natural flair for comedy and also the more troubled Bono as their marriage breaks down.  It is a first rate performance. Sam Ferriday proves a chameleon during the production playing Cher's husbands Greg Allman and Rob Camilletti (with very dodgy wig), Phil Spector and Cher's step Dad Joe Southall.  Legendary costume designer Bob Mackie is given life by Jake Mitchell, who seems to be channelling the great Australian camp comedian Bob Downe.  Tori Scott has the difficult task of giving us a rounded character in Cher's Mother Georgia, given there is little stage time and only a few moments of clunky soundbites to work with.

Director Arlene Phillips and costume designer Gabrielle Slade have made this a production of dark brooding scenes interspersed with glorious technicolor set pieces. Despite the many sequins on display there isn't however any sense of Cher's outrageous stage wardrobes.  I'd have liked to have had a sense of her penchant for the OTT in the finale.But that's not to say the show doesn't look fabulous, because it does.  Choreographer Oti Mabuse finds the dance styles of the 60s and 1970s variety easily,  and the hard working ensemble dance up a storm around the principal performers.

But of course the backbone of the show are those songs...  35 of them crammed into two hours.  I Got You Babe.  Gypsies, Tramps And Thieves.  Song For The Lonely.  If I Could Turn Back Time.  Heart Of Stone. The list,  like the beat, goes on and on.  Some are just short refrains and there were times I thought some of the dialogue could have been trimmed in favour of giving us full on versions.  But that is the nature of the dramatic musical, it is not a concert and the light and shade have to be carefully balanced.

Musical Director David Belton leads his four strong band into the mix with the sequencing producing a big sound worthy of the incredible pop material they are given to work with.  

Overall The Cher Show is a wonderful night out.  Just when you think Cher's woes (she doesn't get nominated for an Oscar for her first movie.  Yeah, I know it's heart breaking!) might overwhelm the piece, one of those songs just lifts you right out of your seat.  By the time we get to the finale - what other song than Believe,  still the biggest selling song by a female artist ever in the UK - the audience are itching to get up and dance. And this production delivers on that promise. Three Chers, one incredible show.  Follow that bitches.

 

Rob Cope for Doctor Theatre

Tour details can be found at cheronstage.com