Million Dollar Quartet

The experience of watching my first London musical, ‘Million Dollar Quartet’ at the Noël Coward Theatre left me amused, amazed but also slightly disappointed. The theatre entrance was filled with anxious people when we arrived and the air crackled with anticipation. Inside we were greeted by music from the fifties whilst waiting for curtain-up. The simple scenery was just a single room: the recording studio in which unfolded the legendary meeting of the four most renowned musicians of the fifties; Jonny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and of course The King, Elvis. The story was too bland for my taste as it was the reincarnation of a recording session that had happened by chance in the Sun Studio, run by Samuel Phillips, the man who had “discovered” the four artists.

The storyline was insubstantial, just revolving around Philips’ agenda of persuading the musicians not to leave his studio, as they were individually threatening to do.

The musical was very enjoyable in general despite the story, as the musicians were phenomenal. Ben Goddard, who played Jerry Lee Lewis, was an especially outstanding pianist and capable singer, and highly gifted in capturing the spirit of the young aspiring hillbilly boy Lewis. The other actors gave solid performances although the least capturing character was Elvis, played by Michael Malarki, who gave a great musical performance but sadly failed to capture the iconic spirit of Elvis. On stage Elvis had a very distinctive way of moving and behaving, a way that banned TV channels from showing him from the waist down when broadcasting his concerts, and that made women go wild in his presence. Malarki did not show this unbelievable charisma and stage presence, which for me is what Elvis was all about.

All in all the performance was amusing; worth seeing if you are a fan of music from the fifties. It was dynamic, fast, fun and lightly digested.

Noel Coward theatre, from £10