Well, you know Les Miserablés, of course. The whopping 1862 novel penned by Victor Hugo that became the 1980 French stage musical by Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil, and Jean-Marc Natel. That production, of course, was anglicised in 1985 under the auspices of West End theatre impresario Sir Cameron Mackintosh with lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer and, well, it’s still playing to sold-out audiences 40 years later – making it the longest-running musical in the entire world.
Les Mis is one of the most beloved musicals of all time, a genuine cultural touchstone – that Émile Bayard image of Little Cossette is a totem of the younger theatre kid set, before they decide they’re too cool for such a West End dinosaur. (It’s okay, they eventually circle back.) There was a 2012 big screen adaptation that many of us have collectively agreed to forget, such is our love of Les Mis.
But when we talk Les Mis, it’s not the book or any of its less tuneful adaptations, and it’s not the French musical – and it’s certainly not Russell Crowe growling his way through the role of Javert – it’s the Mackintosh production, and that’s what Sydney is getting here, more or less.
Landing Down Under as part of an epic world tour to celebrate the West End production’s 40th anniversary, this is Les Misérables The Arena Spectacular, which is pretty much Les Misérables Live in Concert, and why not? As a sung-through musical, Les Mis is a good fit for this treatment. It’s almost opera, and excising much of the physical action doesn’t muddy the narrative (in fact, it shortens things by about half an hour with no appreciable downside). This is Les Mis as rock concert, and if you love Les Mis, you’ll love this – there’s no doubt.
This is Les Mis as rock concert, and if you love Les Mis, you’ll love this – there’s no doubt.
To quickly dispense with the plot, we’re in 19th century France and recently released criminal Jean Valjean (Alfie Boe on opening night, alternating with Killian Donnelly) breaks his parole and heads off to start a virtuous life, along the way adopting orphaned waif Cosette (Alexandra Szewcow, alternating with Samara Coull-Williams, Violet Massingham, and Scarlett Sheludko – who are part of an impressive crop of local child actors brought on for the Australian leg of the world tour). But iron-spined, by-the-book Inspector Javert (Michael Ball, alternating with Bradley Jaden) is on his trail. And 15 years later he catches up with him, by which time the now-grown Cosette (Beatrice Penny-Touré) is in a love triangle with young revolutionary firebrand Marius (Jac Yarrow) and put-upon, too-good-for-this-world Eponine (Shan Ako). As Javert closes in, the 1832 Paris Uprising is brewing (and you’d all be doing me an immense personal favour if you wrote down Les Misérables is not set during the French Revolution on a Post-It note and put it somewhere you’ll see it every day).
Those are the broad strokes, at least. Of course, we also get Matt Lucas (of Little Britain fame) and Australian musical theatre royalty, Marina Prior (who also played Cosette in the original Australian production of Les Mis), as comedy villains the Thénardiers, arguably the big draw for infrequent theatre-goers who get wind of this. Directors James Powell and Jean-Pierre van der Spuy know it, too, punching their appearances whenever they wander into the narrative. Prior was, in fact, off sick on opening night, with Helen Walsh subbing in (and killing it). For his part, Lucas has been returning to this part for 15 years, and he plays it like a music hall virtuoso.
Boe and Ball are Les Mis veterans too, of course. Ball played Marius in the original London production and played Javert in 2019, while Boe played Valjean in the London 25th anniversary concert in 2010. That adds to the heavy sense of legacy that pervades this production, all the pomp and circumstance and sheer scale. It’s Les Mis! The songs are great, the orchestrations by Mich Potter are rich and uplifting, and also a bit heavier and more forceful to complement the arena rock staging. In a staggeringly impressive ensemble – Rachelle Ann Go’s Fantine does a heartbreaking ‘I Dreamed A Dream’ – Boe and Ball are standouts, their powerful, dueling voices carrying the main thrust of the drama.
But while the sheer strength of the material and the performances well and truly carry the night, the staging is at times a bit of a letdown. Designer Matt Kinley gives us a tiered stage, with the orchestra visible at the back and a small main performance area at the front, flanked by huge screens in Renaissance-style gilded frames and dominated by a giant lighting rig.
While visually striking, this set up doesn’t give the cast much room to work, and they largely stand and sing, making this more often than not a concert rather than a play. Which is fine if that’s what you signed on for. Those screens come in handy too, beaming out live footage that zeros in on the main action, allowing the actors to savour the more intimate moments without feeling the need to overextend to play to the back of the room (which is quite a long way away in the arena-style ICC Sydney Theatre).
Although, when the lighting rig descends – as it does frequently – to hover over the actors’ heads like the mothership from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, it has a tendency to block the screens. Again, not a dealbreaker, but those screens are being used to communicate story information – a few key narrative elements play out on those screens exactly when the audience can’t see them. It was incredibly distracting, and I’m frankly baffled at the choice. In a couple of quiet moments, we could clearly hear the rig grinding and clanking as it maneuvered over the stage. And while Paule Constable’s lighting design is perfectly fine, I can’t help but think there must be a less intrusive way to generate the desired effect (unless the desired effect is to wonder if the Independence Day aliens have arrived to blow up Paris).
That might be a lot of words for an annoying quibble, but it’s about the only quibble to quibble about, so please indulge me. That aside, this is a superb production. It doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it certainly pumps the tires and polishes the hubcaps, delivering all the stirring melodrama and tragedy you could want.
Les Mis is an institution now, and the sense of occasion was driven home when Mackintosh himself took to the stage after the finale on Opening Night to wheel out a whole host of Aussie Les Mis veterans for a crack at ‘One More Day – including Normie Rowe and Philip Quast, who were Australia’s original Valjean and Javert, plus Simon Burke, David Campbell, Scott Irwin, Lara Mulcahy, William Zappa, and Nikki Webster. I doubt that’s going to be a nightly occurrence, but this show is absolutely worth getting along to, regardless. It is, after all, Les Mis.
Les Misérables The Arena Spectacular is playing a strictly limited season at the ICC Sydney Theatre, Darling Harbour, until May 11. The tour is also heading to Melbourne (May 14-25) and Brisbane (May 28-June 1). Find out more and snap up tickets at lesmisarenatour.com.au.
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