Jekyll and Hyde The Musical

Despite two runs on Broadway and numerous tours of the US and UK, Jekyll and Hyde The Musical, based on the story “The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde” by Robert Louis Stevenson, never seems to have achieved the success it deserves. It has a powerful score by Frank Wildhorn and generally strong lyrics by Wildhorn, Leslie Bricusse and Steve Cuden, and it garnered considerable critical acclaim for its professional productions. Kate Bennett’s able direction of Fareham Musical Society’s latest offering obviously aims to put that right.

While the show has some dialogue, it is mainly left to the music and lyrics to tell the story. This requires good clear diction and strength of voice from the cast, an excellent orchestra and a decent sound system. For this production, all of these components were present and correct.

Stuart Frank as Henry Jekyll and his alter-ego Edward Hyde really impressed with his powerful and melodic tenor voice. He easily gained the audience’s sympathy for his fight to further his research and the struggle with his evil side. His change of character was handled simply by releasing or gathering back his long hair and a change in the timbre of his voice. This worked well but could have been further enhanced by more contrast in the lighting.

Hannah Edwins as Jekyll’s fiancée Emma Carew has a superb soprano voice and ably showed the confusion and fear Emma felt as Jekyll become more remote and eccentric. She was well matched by Lucy Revis as the prostitute with a heart, Lucy Harris, who attracts the interest of both Jekyll and Hyde. Alex Howat, as Jekyll’s friend and lawyer Gabriel Utterson provided excellent support to the other main characters.

Some stylish choreography enhanced the chorus numbers and the faultless orchestra, under the baton of Rob Douglas, never overwhelmed the cast, thanks to the crystal clear sound system of the hall.

The set was fairly simple but very effective, adapting easily to the required scene changes. A gauze was used in act 1 to hide some of the scene changes but only served to slow down an otherwise fast-paced production, as it trundled slowly across the stage. This is a minor niggle as the scene changes were managed very slickly by cast members and stage crew in costume, and did not need to be hidden.

This was an impressive, top-quality, professional production which left me feeling the ticket price was money well spent.

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