Review: TARANTINO LIVE: FORCE FOX FIVE AND THE TYRANNY OF EVIL MEN, Riverside Studios

Before DC, Marvel and Spider-Man cottoned onto the potential of cinematic crossovers, Off The Record created arguably the most intriguing of them of all: a staged multiversal musical drawn from Quentin Tarantino films which is as sweary, gory and fun as one would expect.

Tarantino Live: Fox Force Five & The Tyranny of Evil Men stitches together a range of memorable scenes and songs into a pumped-up rock show that traverses all of the auteur’s most famous works. Everything he directed from Reservoir Dogs to Once Upon A Time In Hollywood is thrown into the mix and a live band and a large cast bring to life his classic killers and oddballs.

Megafans may be disappointed by the lack of the more tangential flicks QT had a creative hand in like True Romance (the first script he sold). There are no nods either to his cameos like those in Muppet Wizard of Oz (in which he swings a samurai sword at Kermit while pitching a Kill Bill-style version of the classic story) and 1995’s Sleep With Me where one of the world’s ultimate film geeks fervently opines that Top Gun is about “a man's struggle with his own homosexuality”. It’s an opinion.

An undeniable pointer in favour of Tarantino’s initial outings is the quality of the soundtracks. Ben Harrison’s full-bore sound design and the exuberant vocal design by AnnMarie Milazzo (no relation) are just what this loud and brash show need. From the off, we’re pulled into the action from the moment we hear the revving guitar riff of Pulp Fiction’s surf-rock classic “Misirlou” and it’s a sonic rollercoaster from there. A live band roll out a bevy of songs from a deep pit of 20th-century hits including Bobby Womack and Peace’s “Across 110th Street”, Stealers Wheel’s “Stuck In The Middle With You” and Blue Swede’s “Hooked On A Feeling”.

There’s a hefty cast of 15 actors, almost all hired in the UK for this show, and there’s quality across the board. Tara Lee takes on both Pulp Fiction’s Mia and Kill Bill’s The Bride (both played by Uma Thurman) and, in a clever scene, switches back and forth between the two as the former overdoses on heroin and the latter fights for her life against O Ren (Sha Dessi). Karen Mav previously played Effie White in Dreamgirls and her powerful vocal style is a storming presence.  Maëva Feitelson blasts out “If Love Is A Redress” with gusto, lending it real emotional ballast. Anton Stephans has great fun as Jules, rolling out the fictional Bible passage (“The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men”), as does Lifford David Shillingford as Jules’ boss Marsellus.

A surface criticism of Tarantino Live would be its lack of originality with little noticeable improvisations on or extensions of the source material. A few of the original lines have been updated perhaps due to modern mores (Mr Pink is given that name because he’s the sensitive one) but otherwise the songs and script segments are verbatim and there’s a strong sniff of jukebox musical to the proceedings throughout.

Dig a little deeper, though, and there’s evidence that thought and consideration has gone into how the wellknown elements are spliced together in new and interesting ways. The show has undergone updates as new Tarantino works are released but there is no feeling that any of these changes are tacked on or jammed into existing scenes. Jumping from a famous scene into one from another film has the potential to give new insights - but only for those already familiar with both scenes. While having Fox Force Five face off against The Tyranny of Men is a nifty idea, there’s no strong storyline to carry this concept.

The stage setup also does the show few favours, especially given how it touts its immersive qualities in the marketing. Those few in the ringside cabaret tables and the seating to the side get side-on views of a production largely directed to the front while the remainder of the audience sit some way back from the thrust stage – great for a panoramic view, less great for engagement. The immersive stylings largely consist of the cast walking among those immediately around the stage or standing in the galleys above with no perceptible interaction with the audience.

Fans will lap up this broad sweep across three decades of cult movies but those with a passing acquaintance with or hazy memory of Tarantino’s oeuvre may find themselves scratching their heads from time to time, especially in the second half which focuses on arguably lesser works like Death Proof and its lap dance and car chase sections. The music is a blast throughout and the cast seem more at home singing than acting. Even if he retires after his next film, as he has threatened to do on more than one occasion, Tarantino Live is a worthy testament to his genius.

Tarantino Live: Fox Force Five & The Tyranny of Evil Men continues at Riverside Studios until 13 August.

Photo credit: Julie Edwards

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