Has it been a 'Perfect Year' for Sunset Boulevard?

When Nicole Scherzinger was first announced as leading Jamie Lloyd’s West End production of Sunset Boulevard at the Savoy back in mid-2023, no one really knew what to expect. As it turned out, there was no reason for concern: with her absolutely indomitable performance she batted away any naysayers, grabbing the triple wins at the WhatsOnStage, Olivier and Evening Standard Awards – praise from the public, press and industry.

Now, the show has opened its eagerly-anticipated New York transfer at the St James Theatre, and the game is completely different. There’s no cynicism around the Broadway opening – Lloyd’s production is no longer an unknown entity, but instead a whopping great behemoth that has spawned countless viral TikToks and front-page headlines.

Of course, the arrival of a sure-fire West End hit hasn’t stopped the Broadway critics bearing their teeth in the past – the heavily-garlanded revival of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club – still the toast of Embankment – had mixed responses (though is now settling well into a healthy stint).

Sunset Boulevard seems to have soared where Cabaret found a few raised eyebrows.

Our sibling site TheaterMania couldn’t have found many more lyrics for their waxing, with David Gordon saying Scherzinger delivered “one of the greatest performances [he’d] ever seen” in Lloyd’s production. He goes on: “anyone who tells you that Lloyd’s Sunset is minimalist doesn’t know what the hell they’re talking about…. this Sunset might not have John Napier’s gilded palazzo levitating like the original, but they don’t need sets. As Norma says, “they have faces.”

Similarly effusive is Variety, which said: “Scherzinger and the stage she inhabits push each other to grand extremes. The result is something like magic.”. Critic Daniel D’Addario adds that “group dance numbers choreographed by Fabian Aloise become a rollicking, violent spectacle.” He even adds a nod to The Substance when discussing Hannah Yun Chamberlain’s” wordless, agile younger version” of Desmond who stalks the stage.

Other glowing reports come from The Hollywood Reporter, who describe Scherzinger as “astonishing” and the production “magnificent”, while even the normally cynical New York Post says it’s a “scorching” take on the classic. Entertainment Weekly also has positive notes for the award-winning use of video in the show, with the act two opener being “whimsical, shocking, and one of the best parts of the show.”

One oddity is the slightly cool response from Jesse Green in the New York Times, who dedicates a large portion of his review to pulling apart Andrew Lloyd Webber, Don Black and Christopher Hampton’s material – going on to describe Scherzinger’s performance as “exciting yet exceptionally weird and counterintuitive”, while also bemoaning the “meta Easter eggs” for “taking some of the gas out of a gassy show but in the process pandering to the audience.” That said, there were fantastic words for the “gorgeous” cinematography that “set new standards… for filmic theatricality.”

What makes it all the more amusing is that, in his West End review of the show for the same publication, critic Matt Wolf said “the bravura West End revival” was “reckless”, “daring” and “a career-defining” performance from Scherzinger. A case in point for the subjectivity of a critic’s experience!

The West End reviews had a few nitpicking responses and a couple of three-star write-ups, so it seems that, this time around, Broadway has both fallen in line with London, and fallen for the irresistible powerhouse turn from Scherzinger. Next stop, Tony Awards?