Tell Me On A  Sunday | Review

 

The Hawth Theatre in Crawley was packed last night to welcome Jodie Prenger back onto the stage where she appeared in 2014 as Calamity Jane. This time she has left behind the whip and buckskin trousers that she’s worn for 14 months and dresses in typical 80s attire to sing Andrew Lloyd Webber and Don Black’s song cycle, Tell Me On A Sunday.

Filled to the brim with some of Lloyd Webber and Black’s most recognisable and iconic tunes, Tell me on a Sunday is a 70 minute one-woman show following the plight of a young English girl living in America as she goes through one bad relationship after another before finally realising that she is strong, independent and optimistic about the future.

But does Jodie Prenger deliver? She most certainly does. She has come a long way since winning BBC’s talent show ‘I’d do anything’, she is now full of confidence and easily holds the audience in rapt attention as she takes her character on her journey of highs and lows.

The songs hold up as stand alone classics, but instead of just singing the familiar songs, Jodie brings them to life with credible storytelling skills and character. She opens the show powerfully with the well known ‘Take That Look Off Your Face‘ before showing us that she is more than capable of portraying comedy, anger, confusion and sheer happiness within the space of just an hour. There are moments of pure beauty as she writes to her parents back home (Letter Home to England) and her heartache is gut- wrenching as she is let down once again and sings the title song ‘Tell Me On A Sunday’. It was an hour of spectacular showmanship.

The second act takes the form of a question and answer session. The audience are asked in the interval to submit questions and although many of the questions seemed contrived and rehearsed Jodie was genuinely funny and entertaining.

We are also treated to a few more musical delights from Jodie including a duet with her understudy Jodie Beth Meyer of another of Lloyd Webber’s classics ‘Another Suitcase in Another Hall’ which was sublime.

All it all it was a lovely night at the theatre, Andrew Lloyd Webber and Don Black’s songs have stood the test of time and there was no better (or nicer) person than Jodie to re-introduce them to an appreciative audience.

The Tell Me On A Sunday tour is runs until June and plays at dozens of venues up and down the country, many for only one night at a time, so although it reaches the South East several more times you need to be hot on your heels to grab a ticket.

 

Reviewer : Sammi O’Neill

**** Highly Recommended.

 

Catch Sammi’s Interview with Jodie Here

 

Catch Jodie’s other performances in the South East

10th April 2016         Theatre Royal Brighton
15th April 2016         Assembly Hall Theatre, Tunbridge Wells
8th June 2016          Churchill Theatre, Bromley

For all other tour dates click here.

 

Photos ©Tristram Kenton