Telegraph.co.uk: 'Roof-raising'
Beverley Knight excels in Memphis, a thrilling musical set in Segregation-era America, says Dominic Cavendish
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...(T)he slightly dingier end of Shaftesbury Avenue is now being lit up by this dynamic, recent Tony Award-winning US hit. It boasts some of the most thrilling vocal work you’ll find on the London stage, in its roof-raising evocation of the birth of rock ’n’ roll.
The UK production’s star draw is “British soul queen”
Beverley Knight. Her voice is so extraordinary – seemingly containing the force of a blast furnace – that were she signed to do just one number, this would still be an event. But she’s at the loud-beating heart of the evening, playing Felicia, a demure young black singer who is talent-spotted by an aspiring, rebel-minded white DJ called Huey...
The latter is intent on shaking up the airwaves of Fifties Memphis with the best so-called “race music”. That term, much bandied about, helps set the story in the fraught context of Segregation-era America, and the show deftly evokes the turbulent cross-over period when the white mainstream caught up with black subculture – and popular music, society too, was never the same again...
Charismatic actor Killian Donnelly brings winning verve to the role, summoning irreverent shades ofRobin Williams in Good Morning Vietman, standing his ground with admirable determination and persuading us that Huey’s motives – and those of the show itself – remain genuinely pure-at-heart, born of fandom’s passion not grasping opportunism.
Knight’s acting versatility isn’t on a par with the power of her lungs – despite multiple costume-changes, her unwavering look is one of barely perturbable beauty. Yet she and Donnelly convince as tentative lovers across a vigilante-policed racial divide. And the whole show works as one lithe-limbed organism, greater than the sum of its derivative parts.
David Bryan and Joe DiPietro, who between them have produced book, lyrics and score, adopt different genres – gospel, blues rock, ballads, even girl-group pop – as it suits. Even though not instantly memorable, the songs pass period-faithful muster.
Director Christopher Ashley could take things at a less furious pace – scenery no sooner lands than it’s up and away again. But the cumulative effect is to have you itching to rise to your feet to join the revolution – which brings me to one cavil.
Instead of keeping the inertia-inducing stalls seats, couldn’t the producers clear a space in front of the stage for the world and his wife to bop – and/or worship – at the feet of Knight and her merry, multi-racial entourage?
