"It was the acme of the American century and a venal, rancid, ugly sham." So says Shawn Levy in his book on the Sinatra-led showbiz clan known as the Rat Pack. Levy's ambivalence runs right through Paul Sirett's stage adaptation, which tries, somewhat uneasily, to combine merciless exposé with musical nostalgia.
The loose-knit format has Joey Bishop, a minor ratling and nightclub MC, finding his act interrupted by the ghosts of Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr and Peter Lawford. What follows is an attempt to interweave biography and song. Sometimes this works with deft irony. The story of Davis's racial persecution in the army is accompanied by a close-harmony version of High Hopes, while Sinatra's use of mob funds to help finance JFK's election campaign leads straight into Pennies from Heaven. But for me the show raises a large question: isn't one's enjoyment of the songs soured by one's knowledge of the arrogance, vanity and cruelty that characterised the Rat Pack?
This arises most acutely in the case of Sinatra. We all know the man was no saint. But the show reminds us that he not only pimped for the president and cosied up to the mafia, but may have been responsible for the death of a cop whom he was cuckolding. He was also a figure of monstrous vanity: what swung his political allegiance, and led to the ostracism of Lawford by the gang, was JFK's sudden refusal to stay at his Palm Springs pad. Sinatra emerges as the worst kind of playground bully; and, although Richard Shelton captures perfectly his string-pulling menace, by the time he sings My Way I had come to loathe the man.
Easily the most intriguing figure is Dean Martin. He famously adopted the stage persona of an affectless drunk, only to turn, after his son's death, into a genuine dipso. But Alex Giannini brilliantly conveys Martin's comic cool, even down to his habit of rocking sideways while he sang as if half seas over. His rendering of Memories Are Made of This, in particular, is a model of stylish re-creation. And even though Peter Landi has twice the height and not half the velvet voice of the real Sammy Davis Jr, the actors collectively do a decent job of making you suspend your disbelief.
Within Giles Croft's highly efficient production - a joint venture with the Bolton Octagon and destined, I suspect, for a long life - lies a strange paradox. Undeniably the songs get under your skin, while the Rat Pack emerges as a collection of sexist, self-regarding egotists. But I left wondering who actually decided that showbiz skill gives men a licence to behave badly. The answer, I guess, is our celebrity-worshipping selves.
· Until September 21. Box office: 0115-941 9419.
