Reviewed by Barry Lenny, Friday 6th November 2015
After a sixteen-year absence from the Adelaide theatre scene,
Stephen Sondheim's musical about relationships,
Company, is getting an airing at Stirling, in the Adelaide Hills, where the Hills Musical Company is presenting it as their final production for the year. The very busy husband and wife team, Fiona and Mark DeLaine, are the director and musical director, respectively and have not only assembled a cast that can sing Sondheim's tricky score but also an orchestra that can play it accurately and with feeling.
Having started as a lyricist, most notable for working on West Side Story with composer
Leonard Bernstein, Sondheim wanted to write both his own music and lyrics, and he did so in Company, with
George Furth providing the book for this work.
There is no linear narrative to Company, but it uses the device of Robert reaching his thirty-fifth birthday and being encouraged by his friends to find a wife and settle down. Each of the five New York couples who are his closest friends invites him over, and Sondheim explores the state of each of their relationships. Robert discovers more than he expected when he joins each couple: Sarah and Harry, Susan and Peter, Jenny and David, Amy and Paul, and Joanne and Larry. We also get to meet three of the women in his life, Kathy, Marta, and April, as he considers the possibility of taking one of them as a bride.
First staged in 1970, social norms have changed a lot in the passing 45 years, and marriage is seen by many couples as unnecessary. A de facto relationship is no longer seen as "living in sin", and children born out of wedlock no longer carry any stigma. The church has lost its hold on vast numbers of people who have rejected its teachings. Ethics and morals have replaced religion. Same sex relationships are out in the open and, in some places, marriage is permitted. Raising children in such relationships is quite well accepted. Although this dates Company somewhat, it has no effect on the enjoyment to be had from a production, and there is a lot to enjoy here.
Josh Barkley has the central role of Robert, whose inability to commit is the catalyst for the couples to reveal the inner workings of their relationships, good and bad, as they try to convince him that he should follow their example. He is dismissive of the idea because he has, as he sings,
Company. They are not letting him off that easily, though. As Barkley shows us what a superb voice he has, in a solo section, the others then join in, inviting him to come on over, giving us the first glimpse of how well DeLaine has worked with the ensemble to bring out all of Sondheim's complex harmonies.
Sarah, Kate Anolak, and Harry,
Jamie Richards, have their problems. She is on a diet, but cheats, and he has given up alcohol, as long as nobody is watching. In conversing with Robert they constantly bicker, carp, and disagree with one another. They are very competitive and they pit her karate studies against his brute force, which Anolak and Richards convey in an hilarious series of bouts.
Jenny Scarce-Tolley, as Joanne, comments cynically in singing
The Little Things You Do Together, establishing her character ahead of the time when she and Larry spend time with Robert. Richards closes the section when Robert asks him if he is sorry that he married with the pensive, Sorry - Grateful, taken up by Larry, James McCluskey-Garcia, and David, Matt Redmond.
Southern belle, Susan, Lauren Renée, and Ivy Leaguer Peter, Anthony Vawser, are Robert's idea of an ideal couple, so he is thrown when they joyfully announce their plan to divorce.
Jenny, Danni Zappia, and David, Matt Redmond, are an odd couple. She is 'uptight' or, as he says, "a square", whereas he is far more relaxed. This makes for some more hilarity as they smoke marijuana together, Zappia and Redmond having the audience in hysterics. The entire cast have great comic timing but these two and Barkley really tear up this scene.
Robert considers the possibility of a future with one of his three casual partners: Kathy, Nicole Hall, Marta, Stefanie Rossi, and April, Kerry Staight. His taste in women is, to say the least, eclectic. Hall, Rossi, and Staight give a real swing to
You Could Drive a Person Crazy, a comical and vibrant number that never fails to please.
Robert sings that
Someone is Waiting, contemplating a combination of the best parts of the five women amongst his close circle of friends. Barkley fills this number with pathos. Marta is hot in his heels with
Another Hundred People, her tale of coming to New York, another big hit number delivered with skill by Stefanie Rossi. Robert and April talk and we discover that she is not the sharpest knife in the drawer, as Kerry Staight delivers some very funny lines while remaining marvellously straight-faced. He next talks to Kathy, explaining that he had thought of marrying her, in a poignant scene sensitively handled by Nicole Hall. At last he talks with Marta, an urban, new age, hippie, with Rossi generating another bundle of laughs.
Amy, Jess Rossiter, and Paul, Jonathan Knoblauch, have been living together for some time and have decided to marry. Paul cannot wait but Amy has cold feet, interspersing his bustling and enthusiasm with (I'm Not)
Getting Married Today, a high-speed tongue twister that Rossiter handles at a cracking pace, with Zappia and Knoblauch adding much slower counter melodies. This is another of Sondheim's very tricky numbers. Rossiter and Knoblauch generate some very emotional moments at the end of this scene.
Robert is becoming progressively more confused and unsure, as Barkley sings,
Marry Me A Little, giving it a rare tenderness. Another sparkling ensemble number closes the first act, with those rich vocal harmonies fully in evidence.
The second act opens with one of the biggest hits from the show, the huge production number,
Side by Side, delivered solidly by Barkley and the ensemble. Kerry Staight, as April, the air-headed air hostess, visits Robert's apartment and the laughs come thick and fast again. Their interplay in the parting song the next morning,
Barcelona, ends with more laughs. They continue when Robert takes Marta to meet Sarah and Harry, and Barkley and Richards make the most of aqn awkward conversation.
Joanne, Jenny Scarce-Tolley, and Larry, James McCluskey-Garcia, are strong, independent, and very rich people. She is on her third marriage and so, perhaps, not the best example for Robert to follow. Scarce-Tolley gets to sing another of the big numbers,
Here's to the Ladies Who Lunch, a tribute to women with time on their hands and nothing to do. Her rendition of this number was one of the highlights of this production.
Robert contemplates the future and ponders what comes with a relationship, answering his self in song,
Being Alive. Barkley brings a great poignancy to this final number, building to a triumphal conclusion, and massive applause.
The set is a mix of steps and levels, with picture frames in which the cast stand from time to time. There is also plenty of space downstage for the dance numbers. This all works well but, unfortunately, there were too many inadequacies on the technical side, on opening night, with missed lighting cues, follow spots nowhere near their target, moving to find them, and still not quite making it, as well as an often poor sound mix, with voices getting lost below the music. Hopefully, this will all be quickly remedied with extra technical rehearsals, and come up to the same high standard as the performance.
Take a run up the freeway to Stirling and catch this one, as it is not likely to be seen again for a while due to the complexity of the music and the difficulty in finding people capable of singing it. The Hills Musical Company has been very fortunate in engaging such a very fine cast for this production and all involved are to be commended.
Photography, Mark Anolak
