Florence Foster Jenkins couldn't sing. Nonetheless, she took every available opportunity to perform in public. During the mid-1940s the "first lady of the sliding scale" staged a series of concerts and recitals in New York during which she inflicted the same damage on Mozart and Strauss as Katrina did on New Orleans. While some were appalled by her assaults on the classical repertoire, the diva had many fans who were happy to buy a ticket for one of her concerts.
This affable, and often very funny, play suggests that although Jenkins hit all the wrong notes on the concert platform, she may well have hit all the right ones in life. Author Peter Quilter portrays Jenkins as a woman who refused to give up on her dream, and intimates that it is only in following our dreams we can we be truly happy - and spread a little happiness for others.
Quilter's play may not be deep - Jenkins' delusion is one thing; but the complicity of those who surrounded her is more puzzling - and it is certainly sentimental, but it has a joie de vivre that is appealing, and treats its subject with such affection that you soon begin to melt.
The cast all play with extravagant gusto, but the real pleasure of the evening is in watching Maureen Lipman - a woman who can sing and act - playing a woman who couldn't. There are moments when this performance threatens to descend into one of Lipman's batty-old-bag turns, and others when it is just comically sublime; although Lipman is at her very best in a scene when a steely matron interrupts a recital complaining on behalf of the music lovers of America. For a second, the smile cracks and it's as if a landslip has occurred on Jenkins' face, revealing a gaping chasm of self-doubt behind the smooth facade.
· Until April 29, 2006. Box office: 0870 890 1103.
