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THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK (First Night Cast CD79)
 
- Flying heroines, a devilish and ageing hero, and a small-town America hung up on its morality. A potent brew, taken from a famous film, and a sign that tastes in musicals may be changing in a score that seems to recall those of days gone by … But is it good enough?
 
Book and lyrics by John Dempsey, based on the novel by John Updike. Music by Dana P Rowe.
 
Cast: Ian McShane (Darryl Van Horne), Lucie Arnaz (Alexandra Spofford), Maria Friedman (Sukie Rougemont), Joanna Riding (Jane Smart), Rosemary Ashe (Felicia Gabriel), Peter Joback (Michael Spofford), Caroline Sheen (Jennifer Gabriel), Stephen Tate (Clyde Gabriel), Sarah Lark (Little Girl), Earl Carpenter (Rev. Parsley), with musical direction by David White.
 
Overture; Eastwick Knows; Make Him Mine; I Love A Little Town; Eye Of The Beholder; Waiting For The Music To Begin; Words, Words, Words; Dirty Laundry; I Wish I May; Another Night At Darryl's; Something; Dance With The Devil; Evil; Loose Ends; Who's The Man?; The Wedding; Look At Me
 
This is an interesting score, but one wonders what the fate of the show will be. The Witches of Eastwick opened, after prolonged trumpeting in the press, at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in July 2000, to what used (in more polite days) to be called mixed notices. As I write (December 2000) it has already been announced that the show will be quitting that august stage and moving to the less prestigious Prince of Wales's Theatre in the New Year. Of course, one wishes it well in its new home - even if the Prince of Wales is one of the most vulgar of London's playhouses, and this particular, often intelligent, show seems ill suited to its passing trade. Far removed from such niceties, this sparklingly recorded cast recording at least lets us hear one of the most adventurous British musical scores for years, but ambition has to be achieved, and I'm not at all sure that The Witches of Eastwick get there, with or without their broomsticks.
 
Listen to that opening number, in which a little girl gets to paint a momentary portrait of the utterly decent town of Eastwick before the chorus determinedly echo her sentiments. We then get to meet the show's heroines (three of them, our witches in waiting) and the show's 'nasty'. The canvas is wide, but the writers come up with a patchwork of ideas and themes that don't ever meld into a satisfactory whole. Like everything that follows, there is something slack about it, and it lacks wit when it is badly needed. The opening is wasted because there is no attempt at characterisation, and not a good laugh to be had in the interpolated dialogue (compare the opening of another Broadway show, My Favourite Year, in which all the characters are brilliantly, and oh so wittily, introduced before the first number is done with). Despite its efforts, this show also needs a stronger sense of place. Haven't the writers listened to Meredith Willson's 'Iowa Stubborn' from The Music Man, in which the small-mindedness of a closely-knit community is delightfully pointed in the space of a couple of minutes? In The Witches of Eastwick, the brushstrokes are too broad. When Felicia comes into view in that opening, there should be some devastating one-liners, but the writing is never incisive.
 
In a world where audiences have learned to drench themselves in a show's emotion, The Witches of Eastwick takes some risks, but it's not easy to get worked up about the plights of three leading ladies, excellent as they are here. There is another problem, too: a middle-aged hero who is the devil, and no other male worth the description in view to present an option. The writers of Damn Yankees (another show in which the devil tries to get the best tunes) sensibly transformed their middle-aged baseball hero into his youthful, lusty version, giving audiences something on which they might feast their fantasies. That doesn't happen here. Instead, we get Ian McShane, on first-class form as the devil incarnate, but he brings with him a sense of having been around for a very long time, and the rusty, worn charms his character displays are forced into some snappy numbers that don't come off.
 
True, there are a younger couple of lovers, but they deal in puppy love, and have an attractive but unmemorable number, 'Something', that tries to establish itself as the show's main romantic ballad. After repeated hearings, the melody simply won't stick with me, and this applies to the rest of the score. It's tasteful, the work of talented lyricist and composer, but it just won't sink in. 'Dirty Laundry', one of the big set pieces, is much too weak to have made the final script, and too much else is just so-so. 'Dance With The Devil', another central number, goes on forever, and it's deadly dull.
 
Nevertheless, this score will win admirers, and deservedly. It is sometimes thrillingly theatrical, and - what a change from so many recent musicals - its songs deal in specifics. There is the genuine frisson of musical theatre about it all. This is especially evident in the first half, which has most of the best numbers. Act 2 tails off musically, although we get Maria Friedman giving her touching version of 'Loose Ends', another moment I enjoyed but - after repeated listening - can't recall one note of. Friedman works hard throughout (especially in a tongue-twisting number, 'Words, Words, Words'). Joanna Riding pulls out every stop in 'Waiting For The Music To Begin', one of the high points of the score. Lucie Arnaz is slightly less well served, although she is lucky to have a duet with McShane, 'Eye of the Beholder', that provides one of the most memorable tunes of the show. Rosemary Ashe makes a capable villain, but she lacks distinction. One needs to care about villains as well as heroines, and Miss Ashe didn't interest me for a moment, although she gives a bravura interpretation of one of the trickiest numbers, 'Evil', at the end of which she is dispatched by a frying pan.
 
Most attractive are the moments when the three leading ladies sing together, as in the fabulous first act finale 'I Wish I May', just before the show turns into something between Peter Pan, High Spirits and - well - The Witches of Eastwick. It works splendidly on this disc, and - not for the first time in this show - one is touched by the proper magic. William David Brohn's orchestrations are thoughtful and resourceful, and provide pleasure when worrying questions hover, like our witches, overhead.
 

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