In one or another guise the archetypal story of Beauty and the Beast has been with us since Apuleuis’ Cupid and Psyche. For a particularly imaginative retelling readers might want to refer their children to Bellinda and the Monster as told by Italo Calvino. The stage adaptation of Disney’s animated film is of course the cutesy version.
The producers, Pieter Toerien and Hazel Feldman, and resident director Alan Swerdlow, must be congratulated on pulling off a local production that tops the Broadway version. Perfectly cast, Jonathan Roxmouth (Gaston) is in an elite class; Talia Kodesh (Belle) more than measures up and can kick like a burlesque chorus girl; and comic Neville Thomas (Cogsworth) is faultless.
Aimed specifically at children as it is, of the corporate family musicals this is probably the best in terms of having something decent to say. It is about otherness, the courage to be different, about looking through the superficial and the fashionable, and it encourages the reading of books. However, in competition with video games (global sales of which now surpass DVDs and CDs in turnover), the high tech effects endeavour to create a complete illusion that leaves nothing to the child’s imagination.
The critic may gasp at its visual gaudiness, chafe at the over amplification of the orchestra which removes its live quality, may wince at the script’s endless corny puns, yawn at the derivative, cloying and formulaic score, but children, and probably most adults, will be captivated by its ebullience and irresistible pantomime charms.
Cheap in comparison to what you’d pay elsewhere in the world, tickets are nevertheless expensive for South African families, but audiences should consider that there are probably only two theatres on our entire continent that can stage this high-tech spectacle. Cape Town should count itself lucky to be able to pull of such a feat in a relatively small venue.
