Sinatra the Musical West End review – come fly with the music, but don’t expect fireworks

Lovers of the swingin’ Big Band sound will find plenty to enjoy in this slick, intermittently euphoric new musical, arrived in the West End partially recast and retooled after its 2023 Birmingham Rep premiere. The undoubted highlight of Sinatra is Gareth Valentine’s 17-piece onstage band, repeatedly sending an irresistible brassy blare and the persuasive sensuality of strings and percussion surging and swirling through the Aldwych.

Larry Blank’s orchestrations and the arrangements by Valentine and Ian Eisendrath inject some of the mid-20th century’s most laidback but beloved popular music with a fresh, life-enhancing vitality. As an opportunity to re-encounter Ol’ Blue Eyes’ greatest hits, from “All of Me” through “My Way” to the obligatory “New York, New York” finale, the show is a roaring success. Anybody wanting dramatic tension and authentic star quality may be a little frustrated, however.

Sinatra serves up boomer era nostalgia with sumptuous showbiz sheen and a touch of grit, but offers little more insight into Francis Albert the man than can be gleaned from a quick look at Wikipedia. Joe DiPietro’s bullet point book covers Frank, the original “Jersey Boy”, from early stardom through the breakdown of his first marriage, his tempestuous second one to Ava Gardner, infidelities, guilt-tinged fatherhood, and the acclaim afforded by a flourishing film career and Oscar win. It moves fast, rather like one of those Hollywood biopics of yore (only much swearier), but is more efficient than illuminating. His connections to organised crime are alluded to but barely explored, ditto his commitment to Civil Rights.

Joel Harper-Jackson in the title role can now be accurately termed a quadruple threat, in that not only does he sing, dance and act, he also does an uncanny vocal impression of the great Frank. At present, though, he seems hemmed in by having to slavishly replicate Sinatra’s iconic sound, and feels a bit too sunny and, well, nice to convince as the tough, driven Italian-American whose sheer charisma and determination as much as his irrefutable talent elevated him from working-class New Jersey to international superstardom. It’s a surprisingly passive central performance that only really ignites when he’s singing.

Famous contemporaries of Sinatra’s – Lana Turner, Nat King Cole, Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland –  make perfunctory appearances throughout Kathleen Marshall’s high-gloss staging but add little beyond providing useful reference points. Some of the famous songs are used diegetically (there’s an abundance of scenes set in nightclubs and recording studios), while others are shoe-horned in with more charm than finesse: it could be cringy to have Frank serenade his young daughter in her first evening dress with “The Way You Look Tonight” but the sincerity of the moment and the quality of the music prove major palliatives. That’s also true of turning “You Make Me Feel So Young” into a delightfully corny soft shoe shuffle number for Sinatra’s parents.

DiPietro’s script presents Sinatra’s serial philandering without judgement, and commendably, if slightly clumsily, gives the women in his life considerable agency. First wife Nancy (played with winning sensitivity and fire by Phoebe Panaretos) calls the shots in his early career and his bluff on the womanising, Ava Gardner (Broadway’s Ana Villafañe, authoritative and magnetic) is a financially and sexually liberated glamazon, while Frank’s mum (Jenna Russell in a show-stealing comic cameo) is an old-school ballbuster who rules Sinatra Sr (Marty Maguire) with a rod of iron and a baleful stare.

There’s fine, funny work from Lee Zarrett as the publicist whose devotion to Frank costs him his health, and Helen Colby, glorious as the garrulous, self-aggrandising gossip queen Hedda Hopper. Melissa Nettleford delivers an exquisite visual and aural snapshot of iconic singer Billie Holliday, who provides a sympathetic shoulder when Frank’s personal life falls apart.

Jon Morrell’s period-specific costumes are elegant and lavish, and Peter McKintosh’s scenic design, though slightly drab, glides cinematically between settings and is often dazzlingly lit by Bruno Poet. Jonathan Deans’ sound design is wonderfully full-bodied, and Marshall’s choreography fills the stage with high-octane Broadway know-how, even if the production could ideally use another half dozen ensemble members.

As biographical musicals go, this doesn’t match the invention of Jersey Boys or the dramatic power of Tina, but it’s a bona fide crowd-pleaser. Dramatically inert but musically magnificent, this is a solid tribute to a singular talent, and will undoubtedly prove a glamorous summer hit, and, if you close your eyes while listening to Harper-Jackson, it’s like Frank is in the room.