Sisters of Mersey review: Hallelujah! Sister Act meets panto in a joyfully saucy Scouse send-up, writes PATRICK MARMION
Sisters of Mersey (Royal Court, Liverpool)
Verdict: Lordy, it's bawdy!
What fun it is to visit Liverpool's Royal Court Theatre, where audiences are flocking to the latest comedy by Jonathan Harvey (author of Beautiful Thing, and last year's hit A Thong For Europe). Even at a Saturday matinee the 1,100-seater establishment was bulging like a builder's midriff.
Sisters Of Mersey is a subversively unsophisticated Eighties caper that's like a cross between Sister Act and a lewd, out-of-season panto.
It concerns two nuns (one little, the other large) discovering that not only are they not twins; but the large one has a real twin sister in prison — Eileen Forward (prisoner 6969).
Eileen has been 'framed like the Mona Lisa' and banged up for the theft of a jewelled crucifix from the convent altar.
In case you're still in any doubt, this play makes Mrs Brown's Boys look like King Lear. And having the crucifix hidden inside a giant phallus will be considered in very poor taste, if not downright blasphemous, by some.
Lindzi Germain plays Sister Petra Pottymouth (left) and Emma Bispham plays Reverend Mother Mary Monobrow (right)
But as a Liverpool-born Roman Catholic myself, I wondered if the Good Lord might be secretly amused — if not by that, then by the joyful spirit that drives the show.
Lindzi Germain as (large) Sister Petra Pottymouth reminded me of a female Les Dawson, switching between saintly sweetness and gravel-voiced profanity.
Keddy Sutton as (little) Sister Fionola Foghorn is a brilliant physical comedienne who does a hilarious Cilla Black impersonation: singing Surprise! Surprise! while slipping around in amniotic fluid (don't ask). And I loved her catchphrase: 'What am I like!?' Emma Bispham's Reverend Mother Mary Monobrow adds a touch of decorum; while a giant map of Merseyside (illuminated with flashing tower blocks and church windows) makes it clear that Stephen Fletcher's crowd-pleasing production is a loving mickey-take of the city.
A live band knocks out classic Eighties bangers ranging from the Eurythmics' Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves, to Belinda Carlisle's Heaven Is A Place On Earth.
In box-office terms, however, there's evidence to suggest that heaven is in fact a place in Liverpool — with the show selling out fast, at prices ranging from £15-£34 (the latter including nosh brought to stage-side seats).
Fuerza Bruta (Roundhouse, London)
Verdict: Not so bruta
Fuerza Bruta first blew everyone's wigs off in Buenos Aires in 2005, before making landfall in the UK at Camden Town's Roundhouse in 2006.
In the intervening years, its counter-cultural cache — mixing the club atmosphere of a techno rave and the arty acrobatics of Cirque du Soleil — has lost some of its gale-force ferocity.
On arrival, we are herded as usual into the former train shed arena, where a DJ warms us up with dance anthems, including an elderly Abba number.
We remain standing as five performers launch into tribal drumming wearing pastel suits that could have come from Next. Except that these suits have been adapted for aerial flight on wires that allow the team to run round an overhead globe, or defy gravity while cavorting on a freestanding conveyor belt.
A random inflatable blue whale appears from behind 30-foot curtains; the two young men we can see inside rocking it, and urging us to whoop ever louder.
At other times, a young woman writhes suggestively in a transparent tray of water above us. This is followed by further writhing in a catwalk wind tunnel, like something out of an MTV video. Be warned: there is more writhing in this show than a box of eels at an East End fishmonger's.
Five performers in pastel suits which have been adapted for aerial flights on wires
A dancer in a white suit writhes in a transparent tray of water as another in a blue suit presses against the glass
After 70 minutes of 'spectacle', it feels as overstretched as the actors' claim that this is 'the happiest show on Earth'.
Actually, it's more like a party at a super-permissive creche, with music (including I Love It by Charli XCX and We Can't Stop by Miley Cyrus) providing most of the 'NRG'.
It's still fun, but at nearly 20 years old, the show is beginning to feel (whisper it) middle-aged.
Sisters Of Mersey runs until August 3; Fuerza Bruta is booking until September 1.
Visit From An Unknown Woman (Hampstead Theatre, London)
Verdict: Old-fashioned fare
Visit From An Unknown Woman is Christopher 'Dangerous Liaisons' Hampton's adaptation of a novella by the early 20th century German author, Stefan Zweig.
It was due to open two weeks ago but was cancelled after one of the actors became ill.
It now stars James Corrigan as a womanising writer in Vienna who is visited by a mysterious woman with an intriguing story (a fabulous Natalie Simpson).
Natalie Simpson (left) grabs the shirt of James Corrigan (right) in a Visit From An Unknown Woman
The play is, in truth, a faintly old-fashioned fantasy in which the infatuated young woman throws herself at the writer, no strings attached.
'I fell in love with a man who was affectionate and forgetful, it wouldn't be logical to complain' she says, offering the sort of get-out every guilty philanderer prays for.
But if you ask me, she's got every right to boil a bunny — the cad doesn't even see her to the door when she leaves!
