Over the Moon

Synopsis

Set in Buffalo, New York in 1953 and written by the author of smash hit Lend Me a Tenor, Ken Ludwig's screwball comedy played to packed houses at it's New York premiere earlier last year. Show business is renowned for broken marriages. However, George and Charlotte have been together for thirty years and their marriage and stage careers are perfect - until Charlotte discovers that George is having an affair with the juvenile lead in their current production. The ensuing chaos results in Charlotte immediately announcing that she is leaving George for his best friend, George resorting to drink and the juvenile lead resorting to a nervous breakdown...and these events are played out during the evening performance of the play in which they are all appearing. And on a night, when, rumour has it, a big Hollywood director is in town! Initially known as Moon Over Buffalo.

Our Review:

17 October 2001

Joan Collins was last seen in the West End over ten years ago in a famously flopped revival of Private Lives. So there's no small dose of irony in her self-selected comeback vehicle, Ken Ludwig's backstage farce in which a production of the same Coward classic is spectacularly botched.

For that, and several other telling coincidences, Collins' choice is a brave one. She plays an over-the-hill actress fighting for a last-chance career break while desperately trying to ward off the ravages of time. Ring any bells? It can't be easy to send yourself up so, and for that matter, Collins doesn't make it look easy. Aside from being miscast and far too old for leading lady Charlotte Benson, Collins simply plays a bad actress extraordinarily badly. So much so that when, in the final scene, she wails in acknowledgement of the "limitations" of her talent, we can't help but nod in agreement.

Which is not to say that Collins is alone in shouldering blame here. Even with the mo...

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Latest User Review

USER: Whatsonstage.com - 21 November 2001:

I recently saw Over the Moon and think that whoever wrote the review for WOS is not very fair and whoever wrote the clearly missed the humour in the play. It was bright and funny and Joan Collins was great, as always....

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