Taylorian

Drama

FAME

FAME

T he merest of glances at the set for this year’s senior production and you knew you were in for something bold. FAME was writ large above the stage, that omnipresent but elusive and ephemeral substance – as true in 1980s New York as it is now and for ever shall be. Amen. And competition was rife among the young hopefuls of New York High School for Performing Arts as they emerged and strutted their hour upon the stage. None more so than Carmen Diaz, the reckless ingenue performed with such vivacity by Helen Szostak that it made you believe – for a moment – that force of will alone was enough in this world. It was heady, dreamy stuff in those first few minutes, as even the teachers of the different disciplines competed for supremacy: English (a decorous Isaac Taylor Cummings), Dance (a strong and lyrical Nicole Chen), Acting (Archie Stewart in checked shirt the embodiment of the

his poverty and illiteracy. It was a well worked partnership between him and the traditional grace of supposed New York high-born Eleanor Crow, beautifully played by Iris Kelly in her balletic movements across the stage. But just as this production nodded to musical tradition, it also eschewed convention. Iris may have been the swan queen, but it was the Billy Elliot style cameos of Charlie Leigh that threatened to steal the show at times. His muscular poise made everyone sit up a bit straighter to match the posture of a born dancer. What a role model! Accompanying him as his protégé on stage was young Seb Williamson, whose gymnastic back flips drew several appreciative gasps from the audience. And who knew Isaac Reeves would come across so well as the voracious Mabel Washington? His was the Falstaffian role, or more appropriately a Toby Belch, who brought the common humanity out of the would-be starlets. Less

MTS Common Room) and Music, which could only be played by Rafael Edgerton as a stiff Austrian purist of the art. As though watching Strictly back home, the audience looked on as gleeful judges – just who would make it to the big time? And they didn’t come much bigger than Joe Vegas, played with blush-inducing conviction by Josh Simpson. The best actors feel dangerous on stage; they send a ripple of panic through the audience. Sitting uncomfortably close in their VIP seats, the Head Master’s guests did not know where to look as Josh gyrated and sang his way up and down the stage in a libido-fuelled thrall of adolescent fantasy. Glorious. His natural contrast was the measured cool of MD Laryea-Adu, whose Tyrone trod the boards like Brooklyn royalty – his was the voice of counterculture in his go-it-my-own-way hip-hop number – but vulnerable with it too, ashamed of

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