All or Nothing: Theatre Royal, Glasgow- three stars
BEFORE the inevitable curtain-call singalong that must conclude any jukebox musical, the story of the rise and fall of The Small Faces – arguably the quintessential Mod band – concludes with the evening's most bizarre scene, where frontman Steve Marriott's doting, pushy mother Kay is reduced to a sobbing quivering wreck in the face of the untimely early demise of her talented son. The spotlight fades on her grief, and a maudlin acoustic rendering of the title song.
It is perhaps the most speculative moment of the whole show, which prides itself on technical details and careful historical contextualising throughout – Chris Simmons will surely have a riposte to the heckling that greets mention of England's 1966 World Cup triumph by the end of the week. He is the older Marriott, narrating his life from beyond the grave, and sometimes a little more like comedian Jim Davidson than is helpful for what is, in any case, a fairly clumsy dramatic device. His blonde bombshell mum is played by Carol Harrison, who not only wrote the script but also produced the show and has directed this touring version of Tony McHale's original production. No surprise then that she sees megalomaniac Svengali manager Don Arden (Russell Floyd) as the crucial non-musician in the story – excepting the attention-grabbing Kay Marriott herself of course.
Thankfully, the music makes all this rather by-the-by. Live and recorded, it is very carefully realised. With cameos including PP Arnold (Melissa Brown-Taylor) and Dusty Springfield (Sophia Benn), the young Stevie (Samuel Pope) and his bandmates are portrayed by a talented and charismatic bunch of actor/musicians with a great back catalogue to play. Compactly designed (Rebecca Brower) and precision-costumed (Charlotte Espiner), the end result suggests that Harrison's production skills are her greatest asset.
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