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“A whole host of tap dancing, vulnerability and love of the theatre”

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Oxford Operatic Society is an Oxfordshire based musical theatre company that was founded in 1907 by Percy Walters, George Walker and Bill Sawyer. Ever since, the company has won multiple awards and performed in some of the top venues in Oxford’s City Centre. As a company, they perform a variety of old and modern musicals that engage different target audiences maintaining their popularity and full audiences yearly. ‘Funny Girl’ tells the story of Fanny Brice is desperate for a career onstage and the show follows her as she falls in love with Nick Arnstein, an entrepreneur, which tests her as she deals with her career aspirations and the love of her life.

Craig Smith is a hair and makeup artist who created looks that accurately conveyed the time period of when the play was set. Some of the wigs were slightly distracting to begin with but overtime, due to time passing in the play, the wigs got more simplistic and complemented the costumes successfully.  The costume design in the ensemble numbers such as “Henry Street” and “Rat-Tat-Tat-Tat” were visually impressive and had great attention to detail.

The set was minimal and was used to emphasise the story than to overpower it which I thoroughly enjoyed. The centre piece of the set was a large revolving stage that was used cleverly and the actors felt very comfortable using it during large numbers. Although, on a few occasions the revolve was late to start spinning in certain songs but it was recovered quickly and the actors continued to act through it. At a few points there may have been a few too many people on stage at once but that is also the joy of watching amateur companies perform because they involve the whole cast and it is exciting to watch large companies navigate the stage and perform together.

The company was a 60+ strong cast that evidently worked hard to blend their voices together in harmony. The orchestra was faultless and sounded exceptional throughout, guided by the talented Musical Director, Chris Payne. The role of Fanny Brice was performed brilliantly by Nicola Pratley who had a powerful voice with lovely tone that commanded the stage and engaged the audience. The duet between Fanny Brice and Nick Arnstein “Who Are You Now? – Reprise” was poignant and beautifully performed. Ben Ashton who played the role of Eddie Ryan mastered the ability to tap dance flawlessly while singing with fervour and accuracy on every note.

The dancing was excellently choreographed and was picked up very well by the company. The company contained multi-talented performers who tackled tap dancing as the main dance style in the show. The actors performed complex dance moves that were extremely quick and really impressive to watch. Ed Blagrove directed the show and is very focused on the acting aspect, first and foremost, then the other disciplines afterwards. The dialogue was truthful and naturalistic and certainly not overacted. I loved the vulnerability that the actors portrayed it was very powerful and drove the story line forward. The acting-through-song was sublime and impactful to me as an audience member.

The backstage crew clearly had a long to handle with the mics, lighting, scene changes and costume changes. The colour that was chosen for the lights were interesting and worked well with the story that was being told. Overall, the mics worked well with only a couple missed lines but were fixed quickly and efficiently so the actors could be heard.

Overall, I loved the show and would really recommend going to watch it from the 9-13^th July at the Oxford Playhouse