James Church Presents Cabaret Night
With Louise Gold & Jason Carr
Supported by: Andrea
Tushingham and Ryan Stevens
Norden Farm Centre For The
Arts, Maidenhead, Saturday 29 March 2002
Review by Emma Shane
© April 2008
In the poem Slough John Betjeman said of the ‘bright
young city things’ “it’s not their fault they do not know the birdsong
from the radio. It’s not their fault they often go, to Maidenhead”; while
in the mid 1970s, when introducing a favoured architect at a meeting of The
Art Workers Guild he said “I have been asked to introduce a friend
who is known to us all...” He went on to say that that architect “for
years has quietly and resolutely stood for what is well built, well joined
together and not too noticeable”. Now I wonder what Betjeman would have
made of the idea of a puppeteer, whose work is known to us all (even if she
herself isn’t quite so well known), headlining in a cabaret in Maidenhead!
The evening starts with cabaret producer, James Church, taking
his place at the piano, and introducing the supporting act of “old friends”
Andrea Tushingham and Ryan Stevens, in their first cabaret
appearance together. So off to a brilliant start Together Wherever We Go.
A good performance of great Jule Styne tune and good Sondheim
lyrics, but then it was written for Ethel Merman, and as Irving
Berlin once said “If you write lyrics for Ethel they’d better be good,
because if their not everyone’s going to hear them anyway.” Next up A
Stud And A Babe by Roberts & DiPietro, not quite such a
great song, but not bad, and enlivened with props (such as glasses held
together with elastoplast). Followed by Schwartz’s In Whatever
Time We Have, well performed, though I didn’t care much for the song.
Much better was another Sondheim classic, Ryan singing Marry Me A
Little, perfectly well. A more challenging number to do well is You’re
The Top. Fortunately Andrea and Ryan have the benefit of having played
Reno Sweeney and Billy Crocker in a production of Anything Goes,
and therefore display a good understanding of the song. I’m very fussy about
how I like to hear Cole Porter songs, especially those written for Ethel
Merman (or indeed quite a number of songs originally introduced by The
Mighty Merman) sung. But my opinion is that this is a perfectly acceptable
performance of You’re The Top. They very sensibly stick to
keeping it fairly straightforward and don’t attempt anything beyond their
capabilities with it. Admittedly I’ve heard recordings I liked even more (such
as the EMI Classics, and of course the JAY/TER studio cast album
versions), but I’ve also heard a good number of versions of this song I didn’t
like at all. I actually enjoyed Andrea and Ryan’s performance (I’d certainly
rather hear someone like Andrea Tushingham do this song than say Elaine
Paige). I also noticed how comical Ryan was, particularly using his hands,
with the song, as a means of livening it up, this just worked. He got away with
it. I didn’t realise then that he happens to have some experience of puppeteering,
which might account for him getting away with that (am I reading too much into
this?). From a classic to a corny number
The Song That Goes Like This, a highly amusing enjoyable take on
a certain type of song in a musical, though it started to get a little tedious,
but that’s probably intentional. Followed by a very interesting and innovative
performance of Sondheim’s Unworthy Of Your Love. Doing Sondheim
out of context can be difficult. It’s a particular problem with songs from show
such as Assassins. Yet tonight Andrea Tushingham and Ryan
Stevens came up with a most brilliant way to make this particular song work
out of context. They turned a twin soliloquy about insane obsession into a
perfectly normal passionate love duet, sung by a husband and wife to each
other. Another Roberts & DiPietro song Marriage Tango,
a very funny sexy number, the only problem with it, is that I’m not quite sure
how to take some of the lyrics, and wondered in what era and society is the
song actually set? It’s a great number, but out of context I’m not too sure
where to laugh. There followed a coincidentally appropriate number, It’s
A Fine Fine Line from Avenue Q, sung tonight by Andrea. The song
was originally written for the great American puppeteer Stephanie D’Abruzzo
to sing on Broadway. I thought it unbelievably apt that such a song should have
found its way into the warm up to tonight’s show, whose Guest Star after all is
to be Louise Gold, herself a Sesame Street Muppeteer.
Anyway, back to the supporting act, Andrea sang the song nicely. Then back to
the duets, with Ryan and Andrea somehow making the song Money Money from
the film Cabaret, into a divorce number. This worked and it’s a
classic song, but I kind of half wanted to hear some more Sondheim, say
something from Follies or Merrily We Roll Along. As
it turned out they ended their half with the latter, Old Friends,
which they did well, and as with the opening number, sang Sondheim’s lyrics clearly.
(rather more clearly in fact than the Leicester Haymarket cast album!)
On to the second act, the special guest star, puppeteer & actress Louise
Gold. Norden Farm Centre For The Arts had billed this month’s
versatile guest star brilliantly. Basically she’s a famous puppeteer and
accomplished West End actress. As things turned out tonight’s show involved not
one but two legendary British puppeteers, plus a fine composer, so it was a
very special evening for Norden Farm. Louise’s trusty wicker props basket had
been placed on the table next to the back of the upright piano. Nigel
Plaskitt was sitting at the back of the stage, behind one end of the piano,
with something in a black binliner bag on his lap (I could guess exactly what
that was). The first act had James Chruch at the piano. Now the piano
was taken by one of Mr Church’s musical heroes, influences, mentors, call him
what you will, Jason Carr. And Jason got the second act off to a flying
start with his own terrific composition. It may not have been quite a summer’s
day turned cold and sleety, but the poor weather could nevertheless do some brightening up, and what
better song to cheer everyone up with than A Little Love.
Especially as played by Jason Carr and sung by Louise Gold. Miz Gold sweeps on stage graceful as
ever, holding a wand in her left hand. She is wearing one of her standard gala
costumes. I don’t recall her wearing this outfit for her cabaret act before,
but she wears it a lot for galas, the black smart trouser and sleeveless top
ensemble, with her semi-transparent, lace-effect black top. At least in the
intimate venue of a studio theatre, we can see what the whole ensemble of that
costume looks like. When she wears it in larger venues we can’t see the effect
of that costume properly. Tonight there was only one little problem with it, as
Louise caught the sleeve of her top on her wicker basket. Thus, she had to
spend several moments disentangling her costume from her props basket. However
if her costume proved one thing, it is that she doesn’t need a pink dress to
make the number work, she’d make that song work anyway no matter what she’s
wearing. By the same token she doesn’t need a blond wig either, her own red
hair looks so wonderfully striking. Accent-wise lovely Louise sings the song
just like when she first introduced in The Waterbabies. On the
table was a bowl of marshmallows, which Louise proceeds to throw into the
audience, presumably illustrating the lyric “I’ll dispense a smile and a
sweetie”. On this occasion her aim wasn’t too good, and quite a number of
these landed on the stage instead. I’m not, but I wonder if Louise was
wrong-handing them (throwing with her right hand), if so maybe that’s why. The
composer-lyricist himself sang what would have originally been the chorus
parts. As well as singing Louise dances about very gracefully, with a lot of
neat pas de chats (a legacy of her Arts Ed dance training). It’s a beautiful
number. And one which most especially suits Louise’s lovely personality, by
design it IS her line to give the world a little love.
Louise explains the song was written by Jason Carr, and goes on
to say she’s been lucky enough to work with a number of great living
composers, after telling her story about meeting the Sherman brothers, when
she told them she’d grown up hearing their work, and they said it made them
feel very old, she moves on to Stephen Sondheim and the four Sondheim
shows she’s been in (naming all four). Mentioning that Sondheim “has written
many beautiful and lyrical songs” she promptly launches into two that
aren’t. An excerpt of The Gun Song, followed by The Blob.
For the former, instead of a bag, this time she rummaged in her props basket
(from which she produces a blue cloth, a champagne flute, a shoe, and finally
the toy gun). She left the cloth and glass out, to use later. Both songs come
across really well, and last notes of the gun song were a real surprise, as
Louise brought forth a note so powerful you can tell why she’s been described
as “An English Ethel Merman”. The Blob (for which she held
the champagne flute) was taken at quite a surprisingly fast tempo. Louise is
clearly on good form vocally, to be able to do that. Next a number from a show
she hasn’t been in, Into The Woods. Children Will Listen
as sung by Louise Gold with an arrangement by Jason Carr is an
incredibly powerful number. Often when she’s done it in her cabaret Louise has
taken it quietly, but tonight, sitting on the stool, she belted it, like she
did in Happily Ever After. I’m glad to hear her do it that way,
because she’s such a terrific skilful belter, and this suits Jason’s glorious
arrangement of the song so well. While the song had come across well in Happily
Ever After, it worked even better tonight, for two reasons. Firstly
Jason Carr was playing it (no disrespect to Anthony Davie), but
nobody can play Jason’s arrangements of either Sondheim’s music, or his
own better than Jason Carr can play them. Secondly Louise’s personality
and whole performance style fits into the informality of this sort of event so
much better than a stuffy Sondheim Society gala. (Good though Louise
Gold is at livening up stuffy galas).
Picking up the
champagne flute and cloth, Louise leans against the end of the piano nearest
the audience to sing Lovers For A Day. Like the last time she did
this song at Lauderdale she elects to belt the whole thing, it works better
this way. But with two differences, she increased her vocal power a little more
for the chorus, and while singing the chorus instead of miming she was handling
her props, shining another glass – a great improvement. Louise clearly enjoys
the number, and she’s making the audience enjoy it too. This mazilk is brilliant at mixing pathos and
comedy, she has such a strong instinct for what she is doing, and can change
style very very quickly. In her loveable jokey manner she tells us it is with
great regret when she hears a show she auditioned for and didn’t get closes.
Louise and Jason launch into I Told You So, a terrifically funny Kander
& Ebb number about flops. They do the schadenfraude with great panache.
In the second verse Jason lists the various ways to say “I told you so”
and Louise acts them out, though her efforts at putting “a little cheer in it” are a bit peculiar (she’s
done better by that line in the past), I wonder if she’s trying not to laugh or
something. Kind Louise explains she only feels qualified to sing that song
because of having been in two major flops herself, Bag and Ziegfeld.
In fact, although it wasn’t mentioned (after all this is very much Louise’s
show), Jason too has been involved with flops, he wrote the score for the
musical play Eurovision (which probably should have stayed on the
fringe, as Nicholas De Jongh so rightly commented). Louise describes Bag
as a flop she’s actually proud to have been part of, because of it getting into
Trivial Pursuit and The Guinness Book Of Records.
While telling the story of the cast going for a Chinese meal, she adds “it
was a very nice Chinese meal”. Onto Ziegfeld, Louise gets a
little carried away with her conversation, she nearly says they had “four
leading men”, hastily corrects herself to “three leading men, four
directors”, and then slips up again with “three opening nights, and on
both of them we got the most dreadful reviews”. (She obviously meant to say
two opening nights). Louise and Jason act out a scene from Ziegfeld,
where Louise as the secretary reads out a selection of reviews, from which her
boss has to find glittering quotes. It’s a very funny sketch, improved since
their last performance of it, what with an extra introductory line or two from
Louise, and Jason holding an unlit cigar prop. Louise proceeds to sing Mon
Homme. Her vocals are delightful, and when she got one word wrong in
the lyric “You’ll never understand” instead of “He’ll never
understand”, it was such a minor slip up that very few people would have
noticed (only if you are very familiar with the lyric). The song makes fine use
of her beautiful powerful voice. And then a change of style. She tells us that
since then she’s been in a hit. With a laugh adds that most recently she was Mary
Poppins and before that Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but the
hit she enjoyed most was Mamma Mia, the two years she played
Tanya in it. She goes on to say she wanted to do a number from it, but that’s
difficult with a piano, she continues to explain if you take away the pop
arrangements you can hear the lyrics. I am glad to see her put that comment
back in. So it’s onto to Louise and Jason presenting their unplugged version of
Dancing Queen. Jason on the piano, Louise sings the verse and
then picks up her recorder for the chorus. Compared to the last time she did
this at Lauderdale, Louise makes a much better job of it tonight, managing not
to let any giggles get the better of her, until the very last note that went a
little wrong. She controlled herself perfectly until that last note, and looked
embarrassed as the audience applauded. I can understand why she didn’t feel her
performance deserved applause last time at Lauderdale. But this time, she so
nearly succeeded, the applause was deserved. She attempted to hide her
embarrassment with humour, saying that her music teacher would not have
approved of her performance. Louise’s dialogue slips up again, she says that Mamma
Mia “is still playing to packed houses at The Prince Edward Theatre”.
In fact the show transferred to The Prince Of Wales Theatre a few
years ago, clearly a slip of the tongue, since until a few months ago Louise
herself was appearing Mary Poppins at Prince Edward Theatre.
Moving on Louise mentions that Mamma Mia isn’t just a hit in
London, and then brings in a great topical joke “As a bank closes in
America, somewhere in the world a production of Mamma Mia opens”; They’ve
decided to celebrate the Japanese production, by getting the audience to do a
sing-along of Dancing Queen in Japanese. She goes over to the
theatre’s curtains and gets out the board with the lyrics written out. She does
a fine job pretending to be surprised at the audience needing to use the
phonetic version. It’s good, because everyone realises she’s joking with us,
but its very affectionate joking. Sing-a-long over, Louise and Jason compliment
the audience by saying it was “much better than the audience at Jermyn
Street” (referring to the longer version of Louise’s cabaret act, they did
there in December 2002). Louise goes to put the board away, with some
difficultly, and suddenly realises “I don’t need to hide it, because you’ve
all seen it”.
Putting the board down, a complete change of tone, she stands in the
middle of the stage, surveys the audience, and says that when she was
twenty her agent sent her for an audition which “I didn’t know it
then was going to change my life”. From the tone of her voice you just know
that although the line could be a cliché, this living legend is totally
serious. She continues “The leading lady was a pig”, quite a number of
the audience got the joke and laughed, then “The leading man was a frog”,
at this point everyone got it and laughed. She went on “And the comedian was
a bear”. At which Jason declared “No he’s a not, he’s wearing a
neckatie”. Did Jason come in two soon with the line? I wasn’t sure. I
preferred it when Louise joined in with that joke (and used her hands to
imitate Fozzie’s wiggling ears). Actually I preferred some of her earlier
versions of this intro, like the one including the chorus or vegetables. This
time, however, Louise turns to the audience and (with remarkable similarity to
Spitting Image’s Queen) says “You see why Jason doesn’t say much in
this act.” I’m not quite sure why her attempts to pretend to slag off her
pianist, result in Louise addressing the audience with a burst of pantomime “Oh
yes he is”, and we all had to say “Oh no he isn’t”. Like her Mamma
Mia colleague Louise Plowright, the one major problem Louise
Gold has with this sort of panto-banter is that actually the audience
admires her performance far too much to even begin to cross her. Fortunately in
Louise Gold’s favour are two points, firstly we also like Jason Carr,
and so can sort of want to partly take his side, and secondly it is kind of
obvious that Louise expects the audience to behave in the traditional
panto-banter manner. And what Louise Gold expects from an audience, she
will jolly well get. (Not for nothing is she the daughter of a stalwart
Left-wing amateur revue writer). Louise goes on to mention some of The
Muppet Show guest stars she got to meet and work with, such as Danny
Kaye, Bob Hope, Julie Andrews, and Liza Minnelli. (for
some strange reason she also mentioned Ethel Merman –whom she met on a Royal
Variety but not on TMS). With that introduction Louise
Gold launches into one of the unique highlights of her cabaret act, a
medley of songs from The Muppet Show sung by one of the greatest
musical assets to grace The Muppet Show’s team of muppeteers. She
starts her medley with a Sherman Brothers’ song It’s A Small World.
A number so true, and such a reminder of how a performer’s career can come
almost full circle. Next, for Girlfriend Of The Whirling Dervish
Louise launches into her first major Muppet role, one of her fabled monster
imitations, yes the infamous Big Mamma, which she still does
brilliantly. As the theatre lights here are bright, and the audience in several
long rows with no aisles, Louise can’t move amongst us, and having no need for
her cordless spotlight, doesn’t use it. She does however make much more use of
her graceful tappy turns about the stage. I found myself half wishing she were
wearing tap shoes, because it could have given that number something extra
(which in the absence of her cordless spotlight might have benefited it).
Louise darts over to the curtaining by the back of the stage for the next
segment, Hawaiian War Chant, in the voice of her best known
Muppet character, Annie Sue Pig. Actually this sounded a bit strange, it
was rather emotional and not quite on accent. She sang it well, but it sounded
like she was crying. I found it a mournful performance of what is usually a
funny number, and I really wasn’t sure why she did it quite that way (I
couldn’t tell if she was upset, or trying not to laugh, or what). Fortunately
the last part of the medley, Tico Tico Louise performed all for
laughs. Jason (presumably with Louise’s agreement) played it a touch too fast
for Louise’s voice. She’s not a good fast tempo singer. But instead of trying
and struggling, Louise did it deliberately not quite perfect. A classic Muppet
Show style performance, that is utterly gorgeous. Extremely good Muppet
fun, performed by a lady who truly has earned the right to do that wonderful
medley. Throughout it Louise makes great use of her big por de bras, was I
reading too much into it, or was it a kind of reminder, that she had originally
performed all these songs on television through her clever hands. Centre stage,
with her luscious mane of chestnut curls falling about her shoulders, in a very
Muppet-like way, her big wide warm smile, and cheerful sparkling brown eyes, I
couldn’t help thinking that if someone who only knew Louise Gold from
her appeared on the documentary Of Muppets And Men, when she was
about half the age she is now, had seen her on stage tonight they would have
instantly recognised her as the lady whom Jim Henson introduced in that
documentary as “Our English puppeteer”.
From one famous television puppet show, to another. While we applauded
the legendary “English Muppet”’s medley from that programme, there’s a
deft movement from Nigel sitting at the back of the stage behind the other end
of the piano, Louise exclaimed “Oh my Gawd”, and we see Nigel standing
there holding the Spitting Image puppet of The Queen by the top
of the piano. Jason struck up The National Anthem (which no one
stood up for). Louise quickly walks over, picks up a piece of paper from the
table, crouchs down close to Nigel, and begins to read aloud in her voice for
The Queen, while Nigel puppeteers it. She welcomed us, and apologised for not
being better dressed “But we came via Terminal 5” (thus implying a lack
of luggage. She went on to joke about having the French President Sarkozy
to stay. It’s incredibly topical (T5 only opened in chaos a couple of
days earlier). I can’t remember exactly how she introduced her song (was it
state of the nation address or whatever), I was paying more attention to
Nigel’s puppetry than what Louise was actually saying. Louise sang the number, Class
jolly well, I am glad to hear her back to singing it rather than doing it
recitative (which I felt hadn’t worked so well last time at Lauderdale). Of
course this performance is a bit different, because Louise is only voicing the
puppet. Nigel Plaskitt is puppeteering. And Nigel’s puppeteering style,
while excellent, is quite different to Louise’s (for example in the days when
TV Puppeteers had to share monitors, I am quite sure those two would never have
agreed to share a monitor), although of course they are clearly good friends
and long standing colleagues, who have worked together for years, particularly
of course on Spitting Image, where they were both major puppeteers.
It is also a little strange seeing The Queen performed right-handed, when in
recent years we have been accustomed to her being puppeteered left-handed. In
many ways tonight’s performance of The Queen, was a live illustration of the
situation that sometimes arose on those big TV puppet shows where one puppeteer
would loop a voce for their regular character which someone else had performed,
for whatever reason (be it: Louise Gold performing a Viking Pig which Jerry
Nelson voiced on The Muppet Show, or Mike Quinn
puppeteering Hortense on Secret Life Of Toys while Louise Gold
who voiced it puppeteered Raisin, or Steve Whitmire puppeteering Red
Fraggle on Fraggle Rock when Karen Prell was off sick; or Frank
Oz puppeteering an inexperienced performer’s new major character in a
complex musical number on The Muppet Show because that
character’s own puppeteer was, at that time too inexperienced to do it in so
complex a number). At the conclusion of Class, Louise rises and
gets Nigel Plaskitt to come to the centre of the stage and take a bow
with her. It’s quite something to see both of Spitting Image’s
Leading Puppeteers together on stage taking a bow. Nigel goes off stage, and
Louise says of The Queen puppet “I used to perform it myself, but I got too
grand”. Even when she is commanding the stage in her cabaret act, Louise
comes across as a very pleasant person, who doesn’t throw her weight about that
much, so her statement about having “got too grand” isn’t entirely
convincing, in so far as to anyone who is familiar with her performances, it
sounds like she’s joking.
Moving on Louise does her the thank yous, to James Church and
everyone at Norden Farm Centre for inviting her. To Nigel Plaskitt
for directing her show (and puppeteering The Queen), to Jason Carr for
accompanying, and to Matt the lighting and sound man, half joking she said “I
didn’t rustle too much”, at that moment I realised she was wearing a radio
mike. Matt must indeed have done a good job with the sound balance to have made
that so unobvious. Louise also felt obliged to apologise to the cleaning staff
for having got squashed marshmallows on the stage. In fact with that apology
she comes across as very serious and sincere, she really was concerned about
them not thinking badly of her over that. For her final number Louise did So
Long Dearie, one of her big belting tour de forces. I kind of wished
she had done If Love Were All / I Am What I Am because she puts
so much of herself into that medley. However, she’s a fine actress, So
Long Dearie is a great belt number; and when Louise is on top singing
form, as she clearly is to night, it makes sense to get the best out of her
Mermanesque vibrato. Finale over, Louise Gold departs the stage to
thundering applause.
And then a delightful surprise. Jason carries on playing, and after a
few moments Louise appears for an encore. I was worried Louise might be “Too
Grand” to do the beautiful lyrical Rainbow Connection. I am
so glad to see her take her place on the stool, with lovely Binky (the very
cute Muppet-like hand-and-rod puppet) on her left hand. She handles both the
song and her puppet with her beautiful fluid artistry. She is an amazing
singer-actress, with a terrific personality. But she is also a legendary
puppeteer, and when she’s got a puppet as cute as Binky on her hand you can
really see it in her performance. The song is such a magical one too, which she
handles with perfection. I wouldn’t like to hear just anyone sing that song, it
needs a performer who can do it with true lyrical sensitivity, and Louise
Gold is one such performer.
All in all Louise Gold once again proves herself as a first rate
cabaret artiste. A splendid performer, and a really nice person. Jason Carr’s
wonderful song A Little Love makes a perfect signature piece for
her, so does it embrace her cuddly-glamorous personality. Or at least she’s
glamorous in terms of her big voice, stage presence, and extraordinary career.
But she’s not really a diva, despite the monstrous characters she plays
as an actress, she’s far too nice for that.
Tonight’s performance compares very well to previous times. In some
places it is an improvement on some of her previous performances. For example
tonight she is clearly in excellent voice. Make great use of her wonderful brassy
pipes, that is so thrilling. The radio-miking was not obtrusive, and if it was
good enough for Ethel Merman to use in a one woman show (as Ethel once
infamously did), then it’s good enough for any great performer. Sometimes I’ve
seen Louise perform when she’s appeared a little tired. She’s such a consummate
professional that mostly she can hide tiredness, though little things, like her
poor diction and increased tendency to corpse at totally inopportune moments
give her away. Tonight her diction was really excellent, and her corpseing,
well she’s a bit of giggle box, but I’ve seen a lot worse, from her. Costume
wise she has varied things a bit. But the most striking thing about her
appearance is her lovely hairstyle, which really suits her. The more she does
her cabaret act the better her linking dialogue gets, as she figures out which
lines work well and which don’t. Being such a unique individual even with Nigel
directing it takes some trial and error. Tonight her dialogue generally flowed
smoothly. The major part of her performance is of course her wonderful singing.
Her opening number A Little Love is just a wonderful song, played
perfectly, with a great arrangement, which is presumably exactly the way it’s
composer wants it arranged, and one can’t say that, with such certainty, about
any other song in the show. Children Will Listen was one of the
best performances of that song she’s ever done; while Lovers For A Day
was improved by the props. Dancing Queen was better than when she
did it at Lauderdale in 2005, but Louise’s performance of it was not quite as
good as good as when she did it at Jermyn Street in 2002, however it was only
the very last note that didn’t quite work. The rest of the number was totally
fine. I told You So was as brilliantly funny as ever. Around
The World With The Muppets medley was generally good, as it always is,
though Hawaiian War Chant was a little off. However, Tico
Tico worked the best it’s ever done. Of all the pieces Class and
the introduction to it were the most different. Partly because of it being
wittily updated (it always needs updating to keep it topical), and largely of
course because it was staging was quite different to any previous
performance. Cabaret performances are
not like any other scripted stage show. They are the responsibility of their
performers, who are basically being themselves. So it’s important that the
cabaret performers themselves, on any given day, week, month or year are
comfortable with their act. At a point in time there may be things they don’t
feel happy about doing in their act on that occasion. In which case they must
be able to make changes (temporary or otherwise) to keep their act such that
they remain comfortable with it. For example they may need to change the key or
tempo of a song, or replace one song with another, alter a lyric (because
they’re not happy doing that lyric in front of a particular audience), tone
down the choreography (perhaps it’s too energetic or doesn’t suit a particular
venue), or drop a difficult costume change. If such a change is made it may not
necessarily be an improvement, but it needs to be a good enough change to make
the show work, so that the cabaret artiste continues to be comfortable with
their performance. Although there are a number of actors who puppeteer, and
quite a lot of puppeteers who do a bit of acting, Louise Gold is unusual
in being so accomplished in both areas. It has also been said that of the
puppeteers who are also voice-artistes or voice-artistes who are also
puppeteers, that they are usually better at one or the other. Yet when Louise
has done The Queen she has come across as a great puppeteer who is also a good
voice-artiste; for that reason in particular, and also because it is a
character which Louise originated on Spitting Image as both a
voice-artiste and puppeteer it’s been particularly special when Louise has done
it live on stage. But only if she’s happy about doing it. If at a given
performance of her act, she’s not comfortable with it, then to have Nigel
Plaskitt puppeteer it, as he did tonight, is a very good solution. After
all Nigel is a pretty legendary puppeteer in his own right too. In fact if one
was to highlight the greatest British puppeteers of the 1980s, Louise would
surely come top, with Nigel a close second. And it was really quite something
to see Spitting Image’s two Leading Puppeteers together on stage
like that.
Louise Gold’s
cabaret act, however, is very much a showcase of her talents. Nigel Plaskitt
and Jason Carr are an integral part of it, but in the end it’s her show.
In an era when so called popular entertainment has become preoccupied with game
shows and reality programme and people who are famous merely for being famous,
it is truly wonderful to see a performer who in her own way has for years
quietly and resolutely stood for good quality artistic entertainment using
genuine talent and effort, and in fact not too noticeable. Akin to
Betjeman’s architect friend, well given her artistic heritage, perhaps. Yes
Louise Gold is one of the most vivacious and loudest singers to grace show
business. As Jim Henson once so understatedly said “Louise has this
great singing voice”, tonight that was much in evidence. It’s wonderful to
hear live the true tour de force that is her glorious voice. These days even in
the big musicals she performs in she has all too few opportunities to really
display her full wide-ranging magnificent vocal talents. By quietly I’m
referring to her natural modesty and the under-recognised nature of her work, a
performer who gets on with the job often with little of the glory, despite
being a key performer on several major television programmes.
All too often puppeteers, literally out of sight under the set, seem to
be somewhat overlooked performers. Yet tonight’s cabaret by coincidence had a
surprising number of puppetry connections. The warm up act included Ryan
Stevens, who according to his resume has also done a bit of puppeteering
(perhaps not quite in the league of the true greats, but interesting to note).
Then there was the complete coincidence that Andrea Tushingham sang It’s
A Fine Fine Line, a song from the puppet stage musical Avenue Q.
But the piste de resistance is Louise Gold’s cabaret act, directed by Nigel
Plaskitt, who tonight also came to the fore as a strong puppeteer, handling
a hefty latex puppet. Louise and Nigel are after all two of the greatest film
and TV puppeteers in this country, so it was quite something to have them both
performing live. Then there was Louise singing songs from The Muppet Show,
But to round it off perfectly, it loveliest moment in this somewhat
puppet-orientated evening, just has to be Louise singing and puppeteering Rainbow
Connection; a song which surely does sew a little love, when
performed so delightfully. Short and swift it really is Louise Gold’s
gift to give the world a little love. Aided and abetted of course by her
show’s pianist the genius composer-lyricist Jason Carr, who knows just
how to arrange and indeed design the perfect number for Louise’s talent and
personality. All in all what an absolutely lovely way to spend an evening. It
was a triumph for James Church and all the performers involved.
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