From the moment the ghostly floating winged images of the idealised long-gone Follies girls seem to glide across the vast Olivier stage, and the orchestra plays its opening wistful chords, you know you are in for one of the best Sondheim show nights of your life.
Re-creating and partially re-casting its 2017/18 hit run, the National Theatre company is still on top form.
Two of the four principals are new – Joanna Riding is outstanding as the vulnerable deluded Sally, unhappily married to the bumbling adulterous salesman Buddy, played again by Peter Forbes, with a jovial bravado that covers his basic misery.
Alexander Hanson is the glamorous but mentally tortured Ben, playing opposite Janie Dee, who reprises her acidic, bitterly cold. Phyllis, who has most of the best one-liners in the evening.
Their chemistry is subtly timed and played, more resigned and depressed than angry.
Dominic Cooke’s ever-flowing direction and Bill Deamer’s characteristically brilliant, funny, yet balletic choreography help to get us through the rather episodic nature of the piece. It’s a long haul at 2 and a quarter hours non-stop with no interval, but through to the end we stick with it.
Tracie Bennett’s show-stopper I’m Still Here is a little darker and sharper than last time but still terrific. The moment you will take away with you will be Joanna Riding’s rendition of Losing My Mind. She starts the song in a very restrained way, facing upstage, singing into her mirror.
When she turns to us, her face is clown-like, mascara running onto her cheeks, too much lipstick, and a very swept-back wig. It’s as scary as Norma Desmond in her madder moments and in a very similar vein. And as she reaches the final or am I losing my mind? she yanks the wig off, holding it up like Salome with John the Baptist’s head. It’s a spine-tingling moment.
The direction chooses constantly to intertwine the the older generation of hoofers at their 40th anniversary show reunion with their younger versions and at times the stage gets cluttered, especially with the monumental ruins of the Weissman Theatre revolving among them.
But Bill Deamer masters the space, and the fantasy sequence Loveland gives us delicious Busby Berkeley campness from his highly talented young dancers and singers.
Sondheim and his collaborator James Goldman, remind us that we all make bargains with one’s life and the bitter sweetness of this brilliant show lives in all our lives.
Follies is playing a limited season at the National Theatre, in London.
Review by Brian Butler
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