Top Hat review – adaptation of Irving Berlin classic is cheeky and charming

“Puttin’ on the Ritz”, “Cheek to Cheek”, “Top Hat, White Tie and Tails” – Irving Berlin was the master of dazzlingly amiable earworms that can send an audience (be they theatre or film) out into the night humming away. That’s certainly proven in Kathleen Marshall’s new production of Top Hat, the 2011 musical based on the 1935 film of the same name that kickstarted the now legendary collaborations between Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

It’s a shame, therefore, that the book around those iconic standards isn’t really all that galvanising. Matthew White and Howard Jacques faithfully adapt the film but pad it all out with a mix of half-hearted one-liners, cynical japes about marriage and cloying earnestness.

The plot makes even the most contrived Shakespearean comedy about mistaken identity seem watertight. In short – an American stage star, Jerry Travers, is brought to London to lead a brand new production steered by producer Horace Hardwick. There, he falls head over heels for Dale Tremont, but due to a misunderstanding, Tremont makes out that Travers is Hardwick – and Hardwick also just so happens to be Tremont’s best friend Madge’s husband. Wracked with guilt that she may have snogged her bestie’s other half, she spurns the confused Travers, and they all then fly out to Venice where the whole palaver takes an incredibly lengthy amount of time to be resolved.

The bare bones of the film are kept in tact, but director Kathleen Marshall needs to turn the speed up for the protracted dialogue scenes in order to give the Chichester audiences what they want – rapid japes and comedy larks, alongside dazzling dance numbers and more tap skills than whatever is on display at the Master Plumber Awards. Marshall had enormous success with the much-more watertight Anything Goes just after the lockdowns eased up, but seems unable to repeat the trick here.

Truly – the show comes alive when the characters stop talking and start dancing. It makes sense thematically – every character is so swaddled in confusion, suspicion and false assumption that the only time that they truthfully connect is when they dance together, sometimes even cheek to cheek.

The cast is sublime. Phillip Attmore, also brought over from the USA, has all the cheeky magnetism needed to honour Astaire and captivate the Chichester crowd as Jerry Travers – from his first appearance in “Puttin’ on the Ritz” onwards, the leading man quality never falters.

Lucy St. Louis, fresh from appearing as Glinda in the West End, matches him toe-to-toe as Tremont. Though tangled in the web of mistakes that form the narrative, she gives the character enough panache to remain a radiant presence as a co-protagonist – helped of course by her exquisite vocal performances from the off. Moments where she and Attmore dance together could not be more spellbinding.

Sally Ann Triplett, absent from the first half, does the work of Atlas in lifting the comedy beats and all-around fun in act two, while Alex Gibson-Giorgio gets a stand-out number with “Latins Know How”. It’s hard not to feel sympathy for Clive Carter, saddled with some cringe-inducingly bad one-liners as Horace.

Peter McKintosh and Yvonne Milnes’ costumes are stellar, though that’s now par for course for the big, glamorous Chichester musical. Perhaps on the wide, exposing stage it all feels a bit too untethered to pack a theatrical punch – a more intimate proscenium stage may make the production feel more tight when it embarks on a tour this autumn. As a night of summer entertainment however, there’s plenty here to be commended.