The Stage

Blink Twice!

Published Friday 30 July 2010 at 11:07 by Mark Shenton

It’s virtually a rule that musical sequels are never as good as the originals - think Bring Back Birdie for Bye Bye Birdie (they shouldn’t have), Annie 2, The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public, or Love Never Dies, now better known as Paint Never Dries, for The Phantom of the Opera. But the peculiar thing about Blink Twice!, a sequel to last year’s revue devoted to songs from forgotten and/or flop musicals, is that it’s actually better than its predecessor.

Adam Lilley, Anna Gilthorpe and Reed Sinclair in Blink Twice! at Above the Stag Theatre Photo: Derek Drescher

As devised by Above the Stag’s artistic director Peter Bull and director Tim McArthur, the material is more tightly focused and the narration less clumsy (though still a little selective - it’s fine to point out that the original London transfer of Grand Hotel failed at the Dominion, but not to mention that the Donmar had a big success with it is remiss). Someone also needs to find out how to pronounce the name of Stephen Flaherty without raising an unintended laugh.

The production also fares best when the songs are sung straight, not editorialised with interventions of the production. But one of the particular pleasures of Blink Twice is to realise just how many flop shows contain terrific songs - who remembers, in the high school musical mess that was Moby Dick, such a lovely entry like Pequod?

That show was produced by Cameron Mackintosh, as was Martin Guerre, also represented here, and as the narration suggests, if he too is not immune to such flops, what hope is there for the rest of us? Not everyone has the luxury of recycling their flops, as Lloyd Webber has shamelessly done with ‘Our Kind of Love’ from The Beautiful Game into the title song of Love Never Dies, as this show wittily reveals. But Love Never Dies may yet warrant further inclusion in Blink 3, of course.

This is a format that could run and run, unlike the shows that they come from. For those, like me, who frequent Dress Circle far too often - and relish the chance to collect things like the DVD release of Imagine This that I bought just last week - it’s a treat. And McArthur’s polished, attractive cast of five lend it real appeal as they give us a lightning tour of two dozen songs that deserve to be heard again.