Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (Tour – Theatre Royal, Plymouth)
© Paul Colta
So disappointed.
After rave reviews in London, I was looking forward to a laugh-out-loud fun and flamboyant fandango with Priscilla Queen of the Desert, but …
Fun and flamboyant it is, and there are some great one-liners, but overall there’s a tiredness about the piece and heart throb Jason Donovan (Neighbours, Echo Beach, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat etc) seems awkward, behind the pace and out of tune, particularly in the lower registers.
Jungle and Strictly finalist Donovan revives his West End role of Tick, the drag queen who teams up with fellow performers gay Adam (whose glitzy alter ego Felicia is all tail feathers and strut) and classy transsexual Bernadette to brave the Australian outback on a battered, leopard skin print upholstered bus.
Richard Grieve (Neighbours, Emmerdale, Footloose tour) is superb as leggy Bernadette, who is enticed out of retirement following the death of her gingernut-loving toyboy, with "True Colours" of particular note.
Graham Weaver (Chicago tour) is brilliantly camp and dynamic as Kylie wannabe Adam, throwing his all into energetic wiggling and vigorous thrusting – and his "Hot Stuff" is.
The trio encounters low-slung barmaids, redneck-ish miners and bigoted small towners; the lovely Bob (Philip Childs) and ping pong popper Cynthia (brilliantly played by Francis Mayli McCann) whose Pop Muzik routine is great fun if not for the prudish (although it is highly doubtful anyone of a Mary Whitehouse disposition would have lasted that long).
Dangling divas are in fine voice as the camp pop classics keep coming and Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner‘s costumes are wonderfully flashy, with towering head-dresses, outrageous overblown outfits and huge eyelashes, but overall there is something energy-gapped and … well, missing.
The packed house loved it and almost everyone was on their feet at the close, but for me it was more tired tart and no heart.
– Karen Bussell
