The Stage

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

Published Thursday 16 December 2004 at 16:00 by Mark Shenton

While a musical about a flying nanny, featuring songs by the Sherman Brothers and best known as a family film, is even now hovering over the rooftops of the West End, another musical about a flying car - also scored by the Shermans and likewise originated as a movie - has stayed airborne for over two and a half years at the London Palladium.

Seeing the sleekly well-driven vehicle that is Chitty Chitty Bang Bang flying by again there, it’s not difficult to realise why it’s such a crowd-pleasing success. In an age of musical downsizing, this show delivers big in every department, from cast - more than 40 adults, 17 kids, an orchestra of 20 and even a teaming pack of dogs - to the eye-popping spectacle of Anthony Ward’s sets.

But though the star is still the car, the human dimensions of this morality tale of single-parent life, foreign adventure and rescue aren’t lost in Adrian Noble’s expertly drilled production.

Jason Donovan, returning to the stage where he took the town in 1991 in the revival of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, has graduated into the role of inventor Caractacus Potts. Though there is some effort about his work here - he sweats profusely - he has enough charm and an occasionally husky singing voice to carry him through.

Though few of the characters are drawn with any complexity, another sometime pop star Stephen Gateley brings a darkly sinister edge to the role of the Childcatcher, while Christopher Biggins and Louise Gold camp up a storm, as required, as Baron and Baroness Bomburst.