The title derives from a song in Spamalot. Its truth is borne out by this deft anthology show which steers us from the heady delights of 1930s musicals such as Crazy For You and Babes in Arms up to Hairspray and Dreamgirls in the present century. There is no visible narrator: simply some elegant, linking animation and a talented team of 12 singers, six dancers and nine musicians to remind us that the Broadway musical would barely exist without Jews.
It’s fair to say that most of the songs we still cherish come in the first half, which covers the musical’s golden age. Sophie Evans sings I Could Have Danced All Night from My Fair Lady with affecting simplicity, the hirsute Danny Lane appropriates Mama Rose’s big number from Gypsy, the ensemble give us a medley from Cabaret and a rousing rendering of Tradition from Fiddler on the Roof, which, we are reminded, is the first big Broadway hit to celebrate a specifically Jewish way of life.
After the interval there are treats such as Sarah Earnshaw’s prenuptial desperation in Getting Married Today from Sondheim’s Company and a lively quartet, Four Jews in a Room, from William Finn’s March of the Falsettos. But the first-half rapture tends to fade, for which there are many reasons including Broadway’s declining power and America’s post-Vietnam insecurity. In the first half, you also feel the composers and lyricists – mainly the offspring of immigrant families – react to their adopted homeland with a freshness and vigour that has disappeared by the cynical, self-doubting 70s.
But, even if a golden Broadway age turns to bronze, Jewish talent remains dominant. I was reminded of a story, not included in the show, about how the emphatically Protestant Cole Porter one day told Richard Rodgers that he had stumbled on a winning musical formula. When Rodgers enquired what it was, Porter replied: “Simplicity itself. I’ll write Jewish tunes.”
- At St James theatre, London, until 5 September. Box Office: 0844-264 2140.
