I loved this, a thrilling* musical verbatim battle between the Brexit-voting, pennypinching Committee and Camilla Batmanghelidjh, the embodiment of so much unashamed otherness that the cowed Committee would rather just hammer her partner-in-kindness, BBC insider Alan Yentob again and again and again instead!
Some spoilers follow. . .
*Of course, this show may not be thrilling if the prospect of hearing half the testimony of a Parliamentary Committee about an overspending charity really turns you off. I say half, because this show runs 1 hour 30 minutes without an interval, and the hearing it is extracted from was 3 hours long. In fact, it's less than half the original hearing, as said running time also includes multiple injections of written testimony submitted by interested parties to the hearing, read out by the actors, as well as the musically-rendered, poetic repetition of key phrases that Hadley Fraser (or should it be "phraser"?) and Josie Rourke wish to emphasise (For example, "We want to learn," which got me thinking, "what you really want is a scapegoat!").
Because I confess, I came to this show biased and invested, as I admire Camilla Batmanghelidjh, having attended a Kids Company (Batmanghelidjh's now defunct Charity) Christmas event in 2013, in which she raised a ton of money for the most vulnerable children in London, including the children of drug addicts, violent abusers, sex workers and the poor, and all combinations of the above. That holiday period, she had already overseen the wrapping of 7,000 presents, as well as food parcels for their families. She was Santa Claus to these children, albeit not bedecked in a blood red suit, but all the fabulous colours of the rainbow.
Still, even for those who consider Batmanghelidjh to be "the loathsome Batman woman" or simply "that dreadful woman" (descriptions taken from this thread, above), there is still much to stimulate, as this is a dramatic face-off between two sides, and if you really do hate her, you can just root for the other side, The Committee (of Brexit-voters).
The inclusion of that critical detail in this show, spelled out at the beginning, that the members of this Committee all voted for Brexit, is topically energising but also problematic. For the Committee's Brexit stance ostensibly has nothing to do with monitoring the spending of a Children's charity, except to exercise a Remainer like me to internally rage at the Committee "So you are willing to tank the economy to slow down immigration, but you begrudge the poorest kids in London getting a fancy pair of trainers to treasure at Christmas!?" (At one point, indeed, the Committee all accusingly hold up examples of the fanciest footwear, as if treating poor children with such trainers were a terrible crime). But this is problematic, as voting Brexit is patently not a signifier of heartlessness, and if Brexit voting audience members get the feeling that the show is implying as much, that will alienate them, and will not serve the needs of the children, which ultimately is all that matters.
Sumptuous strings underlie most of the musical phrasing in the show, which infuses dry political statements with swells of emotion.
An enigmatic Sandra Marvin is fantastic as Batmanghelidjh, embodying the unnerving unshakeable confidence that Batmanghelidjh had, that she was always doing the right thing, no matter how spendthrift and questionable her accounting practices. As Alan Yentob, Omar Ibrahim is more openly bruised and fazed, infusing Yentob's defeated martyr with a rebellious and incendiary compassion for the Charity's children, who he insisted be prioritised before spending cuts.
Marvin and Ibrahim are the stars of the show, as the focus is on them, two lone figures, humiliated by the tabloids, facing off against the vast panel of the Committee and Public Opinion. Their back is to the front facing audience, so while seated, the front facing audience must watch the faces of Marvin's Batmanghelidjh and Ibrahim's Yentob on two big panel screens directly above the arrayed Committee, who directly face that audience.
In a side seat, I could see the profiles of both the Committee and the Questioned facing off. But the front facing audience need not fear that they will not directly see the faces of the stars of the show, as, at emotional highpoints in their testimony, Batmanghelidjh and Yentob spring from their seats to pace the floor, facing the audience in all directions, as they sing impassioned defenses of their actions.
On the Committee, I was delighted to see David Albury, who impressed as the junkie, Fleetwood, in Southwark's "This Life" and who impressed again as the Committee's Junior Clerk. As Chief Clerk, Joanna Kirkland is a wonderfully empathetic circus master of the proceedings, a uniquely unbiased voice, standing between the condemnation of the Committee and the indignation of the Accused. Alexander Hanson is his usual delicate yet commanding self, as the Conservative Bernard Jenkin MP, confidently and precisely leading the Committee through some lovely sounding harmonic interrogations, and I also loved Anthony O'Donnell as Labour's Paul Flynn MP, hale and hearty yet flinty.
As far as verbatim musicals go, I enjoyed this much more than the equally brilliant "London Road," which, with the poor working girls dead, had no rooting interest, as it revealed the shallow callowness at the heart of middle class flower arrangers, enjoying tea and biscuits on top of those girls' graves. Here, Marvin's Batmanghelidjh and Ibrahim's Yentob may be buried, but they furiously and entertainingly resurrect themselves and their cause for an almighty and ambiguous battle, which noone can win, and only London's most vulnerable children must lose.
4 and a half stars.
