Sinatra, The Final Curtain review, LOST

If you're a fan of Rat Pack crooning you'll love Sinatra, The Final Curtain. I was rocking along in my seat to songs remembered from childhood. My companion, aged 83, beamed throughout. As the title suggests, Sinatra, The Final Curtain is a vehicle for a cast of five to knock out some of the legendary crooner's greatest hits: You Make Me Feel So Young, In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning, New York New York, My Way...  It's fun. That's the good bit.

The bad bit while being pretty bad, isn't so awful it's a deal breaker. Unless, of course, you're not enamoured of lounge music classics in which case the title alone will have put you off. So here's the bad: the script is wooden and painfully workaday. Its sole purpose is to fill in gaps - number of wives, etc - in Sinatra's life. This it does through a dull series of exchanges between the singer, who's on his deathbed in hospital, and a young nurse. In the wings are a younger Sinatra and a rounded Dean Martin who provide musical counterpoints. While they're both good enough singers for karaoke, and Dean has huge charm on stage, they're not good enough for a serious show. My companion, who was in fact my mum, whispered: "They're more like Morecambe and Wise".

The main performer in Sinatra, The Final Curtain, is however it's redeeming feature. As well as being a Sinatra tribute act, Moray Innes is an Army Sergeant who's taken leave to perform. Innes is as handsome as the older Sinatra and performs his numbers beautifully. One's only regret is that he doesn't deliver the whole repertoire as the performance goes up several notches each time he sings. That said, it was well worth being there for those numbers he did deliver.

In conclusion: A Sinatra revival is long overdue, and this cack-handed but charming tribute is a reminder of how extraordinary he was, and an indication of how good it could be with some strong writing and characterisation. Innes is cracking and the others are okay enough to send you home smiling.

References

LOST Theatre, 208 Wandsworth Road, London SW8 2JU.