Extraordinary hairdos

THEATRE REVIEW Hairspray
SHAFTESBURY THEATRE
Many actors Cary Grant, Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis, Alec Guinness, Dustin Hoffman and Robin Williams among them have dressed up as women: but they were always men disguised as women. In Hairspray we have something quite different. The lead actor isn't in disguise; he's actually playing a female character. The actor is doing what actors did in ancient Greece and still do in Noh and Kabuki theatre. There's a nice story doing the rounds, and it may even be true. Michael Ball's fans are going to the box office during the interval and asking for their money back, complaining bitterly that he's not in the show. It is then pointed out that the big. fat lady on stage playing the heroine's mother is Michael Ball.
The action is set in Baltimore in 1962, an era of racial segregation and extraordinary hairdos. An obese teenage girl longs to appear on a highly popular television dance programme. She's a nice girl with a social conscience and believes black kids have the same rights as white kids. The musical has something important to say about racial integration and obesity and says it in an optimistic, simplistic, warm-hearted, non-hectoring, feel-good way. The show has a great score by Marc Shaiman. It has witty lyrics. Jack O'Brien's production is dance-driven. The energy is fantastic and Jerry Mitchell's choreography looks so much better on stage than it does on screen, mainly because in a theatre you get to see the whole cast in one go and not in a. series of edited close-ups.
The Giant
HAMPSTEAD THEATRE
Antony Sher's epic drama interesting, well-acted and verbose takes place in hedonistic Florence in 1501, when Michelangelo was 26 and Leonardo da Vinci was 53 and the two were competing to sculpt a giant marble slab. In real life the men had only met once in the street. Here, they meet on a number of occasions and are not only rivals in art but also in love with a beautiful 18-yearold quarryman. Michelangelo (John Light), a godly man, mortified and frustrated by his sexual feelings, lives in fear of damnation. He puts his passion into his art and remains celibate. Leonardo (Roger Allam), having led a dissipated youth, now finds that sex disgusts him and puts his passion into painting, poetry, sculpture, architecture and science. He, too, is celibate. The lad is Michelangelo's assistant and model. It says much for Stephen Hagan, who is making his professional stage debut, that he can stand completely naked in front of the statue of David and not look ridiculous. The superhuman statue is presented as a political statement, a symbol of Florence's resurgence, pride and cultural.superiority: a warning to other cities and nations not to mess with it.
Cloud Nine
ALMEIDA THEATRE
Caryl Churchill writes about sexual and colonial repression in Victorian and modem times, offering audiences a variety of taboo subjects. The first act, set in darkest Africa, is a farcical parody of England, empire and family as portrayed by Rudyard Kipling. The second act is set in the permissive 1970s. Artistic director Michael Attenborough describes Cloud Nine as one of the great plays of the late 20th century, beautifully bawdy, desperately funny and truly touching. It's certainly bawdy. But is Cloud Nine really one of the great plays of the 20th century? Surely not. The first act might survive on its own, provided it kept its essential ingredient: crossdressing. Theatre has always been a drag since time immemorial.
Robert Tanitch
Robert Tanitch's lavishly illustrated year-by-year chronicle, London Stage in the 20th Century is published by Haus Publishing.