An American in Paris

Review by: Paul Towers, 06 December 2017

An American in Paris by George & Ira Gershwin and Craig Lucas

Dominion Theatre, London – runs to 6 January 2018

“A true feast for the eyes..”

I emerged from the still under renovation Tottenham Court Road underground station into the bustle of Christmas shoppers at the tail end of London’s Oxford Street. It wasn’t as cold as I expected for the first week in December but the dazzling awning of the Dominion Theatre proclaimed the glitzy pleasure An American in Paris promised.

According to the programme the theatre has undergone a full restoration to its former glory after decades of identity changes. It has gone from its original role as a theatre in 1929 to its reincarnation into a cinema with forays into cabaret until the late 80’s when it returned to its roots of musical theatre specialising in very long run shows.

The foyer of the theatre is a beautifully restored entrance to this emporium of magic. The auditorium is sumptuously decorated in gold and deep red. The thing that lets this, and some other West End theatres, down is that between the entrance and the auditorium scant regard for aesthetics seem to have been paid to the walls. The huge panels of plaster, while beautifully restored, are bare and cry out for murals, pictures, replica posters, anything to commemorate the great artistes that have played there in the past. In homage to past successes there is a Chaplin bar, a Freddie Mercury room; why are these legends not pictorially celebrated?

Anyway enough about the theatre, let’s get to the show. An American in Paris was initially a ballet written by George Gershwin in 1928. In 1951 it was made into a film written by Alan Jay Lerner and directed by Vincente Minelli as a vehicle for the talents of Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron. The lyrics were added by George’s brother Ira and Saul Chaplin. From the film a stage play was inspired and created by Christopher Weeldon who directs and choreographs it.

The show premiered in Paris, appropriately enough, in 2014, transferred to Broadway in 2015 and arrived in London in 2017.

As with many stage musicals the story is fairly simple. A GI is expatriated in Paris after World War 2 and is struggling to earn a living as a painter. Along with his friends, a composer and a French singer the trio all fall for the same woman and fairly good naturedly compete for her affections.

The large cast are, obviously, incredibly talented dancers and are relatively unknown unless you are a ballet aficionado (which I am not) but don’t let the lack of a ‘name’ put you off grabbing a ticket for the remainder of the run.

The story is told with a combination of dances and songs with dialogue to link the story together. The dances vary from classical ballet to more modern styles and the song list is crammed with classics. That in itself would make for a very entertaining show but then you get the innovative set, designed by Bob Crowley, utilising breathtaking projections and animations, many in the style of charcoal drawings of rainy Paris, to whisk us from back streets to the Seine to boudoirs across the city. A true feast for the eyes.

I was sat halfway up in the gallery and consider £20 for the seat to be a bargain.