Poor Kevin Clifton. While most of his fellow Strictly professionals limit themselves to spin-off dance tours, the 2018 winner is trapped in a stunningly lame musical adaptation of a 1998 Adam Sandler film. Was Kev tricked into it? Are his loved ones being held hostage? Did he not think, on hearing the lyric “when life gives you garbage, you use it to climb” – in a song called Come Out of the Dumpster, no less – that he should call his agent?
Sandler’s movie is a briskly routine romcom in which a wedding singer and a waitress save each other from bad romantic choices. Its charm lies in the way it treats the music, fashion and tech of its 1980s setting with both wry mockery and deep affection.
All subtlety has been stripped from the stage version, and the greatest-hits 80s soundtrack binned for a beige soft-rock score and lyrics by Matthew Sklar and Chad Beguelin. The musical opened and closed on Broadway in 2006.
Clifton is no actor, but that’s barely noticeable since the script, and the cavernously unatmospheric Wembley Troubadour, require performances so brash and cartoonish they would shame a panto. His singing voice is nothing special. Worse, his dancing is subsumed in a blur of indifferent choreography from which only one number – All About the Green – stands out. As if to add insult to injury, poor Kev suffered a catastrophic trouser malfunction early on opening night.
His character, and that of his love interest Julia (Rhiannon Chesterman) are insipid. Others get off far worse. Julia’s friend Holly (Tara Verloop, a saving grace) is slut-shamed and his gay bandmate and raunchy grandma (Sandra Dickinson) are figures of fun. Responsibility for this coarse, lazy farrago lies mostly with director and choreographer Nick Winston, though dishonourable mention must go to designer Francis O’Connor for a set that consists largely of a fence and a billboard.
Kevin, if you are being held against your will, give us a sign.
Until March 1 (0844 815 4865, troubadourtheatres.com)
