Marie Clark Musical Theatre celebrate their fiftieth year of operating as a community based theatre company with a production that requires a large and diverse cast, The Music Man. This is a piece of musical theatre that was written in the 1950’s about the early 1900’s and pays tribute to a vaudevillian style of entertainment, so it is deliciously historic and yet remarkably forward thinking on many levels with themes and values that may surprise a contemporary audience and feel more familiar than they’d first expect.
The story tells of a travelling music Professor Harold Hill (played by the exuberant David MacGillivray) who arrives in a small Midwestern American town to convince residents they purchase musical instruments from him, for their children, in order to form a band; the Professor promises to lead the formation of the band himself and encourages the kids to “think through the music” he promises they will eventually play, once the instruments on order finally arrive.
Although the locals are somewhat apprehensive to begin with, the Professor pummels through their scepticism using fast talking charms and warnings of the dangers associated with idle kids becoming dangerous to the values of the community.
Audiences are well ahead of the characters on stage because they’re informed in the first musical number of the piece, that the Professor is indeed a con-man, and has no intention of doing more than taking the townsfolk’s money and running. Once the audience are set up with this insider knowledge it provides a perspective that allows them to see subtle, amusing changes in characters that develop as the story plays out.
Set at a time when Vaudeville was extremely popular, the show combines story elements and staging that echoes some of the best vaudevillian tropes which form a type of shorthand for audiences to fill in the emotional journeys of characters, frequently used in film and popular streaming shows today, and the musical numbers are often surprisingly unpredictable.
This musical leans away from the well-worn territory of Rogers and Hammerstein although there are some very melodic numbers. The highly accomplished ensemble Marie Clark Musical Theatre have gathered includes all ages, with one stand out performance coming from the ten year old playing Winthrop Paroo (Henry Greig) who transforms from an ill at ease kid on the margin, into a bright self-confident young fella under the effect of the Professor’s charms. His elder sister Marian Paroo (Emily Fitzpatrick, in another outstanding performance) is charmed in a different way, and delivers a refreshingly unorthodox heroine.
The Choreography (Linda Williams, assisted by Irena Setchell), Musical Direction (Ben Francis) and Direction (Adam Goodburn) is nothing less than superlative in the way it keeps the production vibrantly alive from start to finish. This faultless production of The Music Man is suitable for the whole family and goes the distance to demonstrate what a vast field of wonderfully talented performers there are working on stage, and behind the scenes, in South Australia’s huge Community Theatre circuit.
The Music Man
Until 27th of July, 2024
The Arts Theatre, Adelaide
Image credit: Daniel Salmond
