Arts & Culture
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n this brilliantly energetic, memorably tuneful, fast moving musical, of course they can. The book is written by some of the cast members, known as SpitLip, and their abundant enthusiasm, and connection with their creation, is infectious. From the moment the cast leapt onto the stage, performing a melodic, beautifully synchronised introduction, they had the audience with them, cheering wildly. I have never seen such a bond between the audience and the cast. Natasha Hodgson, as Ewen Montagu, and David Cumming as Charles Cholmondely are two naval intelligence mavericks who come up with a plan to fool Hitler. Natasha has the clipped vowels of a public school boy born to rule, and though very slight in stature, completely commands the stage as a toff. David Cumming is a nerd with bulging eyes and a moustache. He has an obsession with insects, and spends quite some time pondering, amongst other things, whether a newt has a penis.
Operation Mincemeat at Southwark Playhouse Review by Susan Isaacs Arts and Restaurant critic
The year is 1943 and the war is not looking good for Britain. Can a team of MI6 naval intelligence officers in braces defeat Hitler, by floating a stolen corpse, carrying deliberately misleading documents as a decoy, off the coast of Spain? They call it Operation Mincemeat. 24 Southwark BUSINESS TODAY
Claire-Marie Hall is Jean Leslie, who aspires to do grander things than make the tea. She makes a dramatic transition from mousy tea girl, dressed in white shirt and tweed trousers, to a vamp in black suspenders and bare thighs, singing the beautifully tuneful Let Me Die in Velvet. Jak Malone, as Hester Leggett, and as a sea Captain, moves seamlessly from gender to gender without changing an item of clothing. The characters have to invent a life story for the corpse of an unidentified tramp. Jak, sings a very moving ballad when he has to play the invented girlfriend of this corpse writing a letter to her boyfriend, who has suddenly disappeared off to fight a war. There are some very effective devices which set us firmly in the period of the end of the Second World War. The Bakelite telephones, plummy accents, suits with braces, and black and white costumes, give the effect of a black and white film. Bond creator, Ian Fleming, makes an appears in the naval intelligence offices, and a fishing crew use wooden chairs to give the effect of loading cargo on a ship. The orchestra, squeezed into a tight space to the left the of Southwark Playhouse stage, give a spirited performance. The Southwark Playhouse with its industrial chic, railway side location , and unadorned electric lights, is the ideal setting for this musical set in the 1940’s It evokes the spirit of wartime Britain, before you even see the performance. Because of the pandemic, it took a vast amount of determination from the cast and production team to bring this delightful, spirited musical, to the stage. Do support them. They have done a wonderful job.
