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A smart production in need of more pizzazz - Guys and Dolls, Manchester Royal Exchange, review

The cast of Guys and Dolls at the Manchester Royal Exchange - Manuel Harlan
The cast of Guys and Dolls at the Manchester Royal Exchange - Manuel Harlan

It makes perfect sense to relocate Frank Loesser’s glorious musical – one of Broadway’s very best – to Harlem in its Twenties renaissance, as Michael Buffong does here in this all-black production by Talawa.

Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows’s book, based on Damon Runyon’s legendary short stories about a self-contained community living on the margins, feels right at home in black New York. Here, the neon dazzle of Times Square has been replaced by a solitary sign for a drug store. One of the few props in Soutra Gilmore’s largely bare set is a street sign, pointedly showing Broadway, with its bright lights, as a place somewhere else.

Yet there is a fair bit of flavour in this stripped-back staging, even if Buffong’s production never fully wins out against the constraints of the Royal Exchange’s modest stage. Nathan Detroit and his shady bunch of after-dark gamblers and crap shooters sport jewel-coloured suits and two-tone shoes.

Undercurrents of jazz, gospel and blues add grain, grit and a whole lot of extra funk to Loesser’s indestructible score. Kenrick Stanley’s faintly hip hop-influenced choreography comes into its own in the game of craps that takes place in the sewer – played out superbly here in the form of a slick, hip-swinging dance in the shadows.

Ray Fearon is just terrific as the blustering commitment-phobe Detroit, blending easy charm with the always close-to-the-surface panic of a man who lives entirely on his wits. One of the many joys of Guys and Dolls, beautifully underlined here, is the way it tempers its romanticism with a strong dose of realism. These gamblers and hustlers might be for the most part slightly haunted by a potential better version of themselves – but it’s only ever slightly.

Ashley Zhangazha in Guys and Dolls - Credit: Manuel Harlan
Ashley Zhangazha in Guys and Dolls Credit: Manuel Harlan

Whatever reforming changes they may make to their behaviour, you sense that Fearon’s Detroit and Ashley Zhangazha’s equally excellent Sky Masterson know deep down what sort of men they really are. And, in turn, Lucy Vandi, in a notably unusually mature incarnation of Detroit’s long-suffering fiancée Adelaide, exquisitely expresses the human cost, in one of the most emotionally sensitive performances of this role I’ve seen.

There are other lovely touches. Ako Mitchell’s louche Nicely-Nicely is more laid back than a reclining sofa. I especially enjoyed the tender rendition of More I Cannot Wish You by Trevor A Toussaint’s Arvide Abernathy.

Elsewhere though, Abiona Omonua has yet to find the stark contradictions that make the devout, buttoned up missionary Sarah Brown such a captivating and essential character. And I’m afraid I sorely missed the sense of spectacle so crucial to Loesser’s high-gloss fantasy. This production, wonderful though it often is, could do with a dash more pizzazz.

Until Jan 27. Tickets: 0161 833 9833; royalexchange.co.uk