REVIEWS

My One and Only - Chichester Festival Theatre
Dominic Cavendish 26/07/2001

A musical so hot, the crowd needs cooling down

Viewers at the back of the stalls could be forgiven for envying those sitting beside the Chichester Festival Theatre stage for the unexpected shower they received mid-way through the British premiere production of the 'lost' Gershwin musical My One and Only.

For this tap-dancing extravaganza is hot, and the number during which the above deluge occurs is probably the most sizzling of the lot. Washed up together on an island paradise, Janie Dee's Edythe Herbert (the English heroine) and Tim Flavin's Captain Chandler (the all-American hero) sing one of the Gershwin brothers' steamiest smoochies: 'S Wonderful'. Devouring each other with every look, the pair go from petite, flirtatious movements - sitting side-by-side, pressing back-to-back - to an ecstatic, delirious shoe shuffle in two parallel paddling pools, before splash-landing together in a coiling embrace. 'S Marvellous.

Obviously a good deal of credit must go to the choreographer Craig Revel Horwood. He knows how to build from the simplest, slinkiest details - finger-clicks, hands-in-pockets insouciance - to full-blown, high-kicking riots.