‘Here You Come Again’ is not easy to put into a genre. Yes, it’s a musical – a jukebox musical even – with a terrific catalogue of Dolly Parton songs as its backbone – but talking anatomically and metaphorically, it also has a great big heart which pumps away and sucks you in.
The show was written during Covid by Bruce Vilanch along with husband-and-wife team Gabriel Barre and Tricia Paoluccio. This version was adapted from a US to a UK setting by Jonathan Harvey. It concerns the incredibly cheesy idea of a single chap (called of course Kevin), who is on the verge of losing all hope for any kind of future, with nothing to do in his attic Covid prison above his parents’ house but to drink too much and pop anti-depressants like they are a tube of Smarties.
Kevin is a Dolly Parton devotee with posters and paraphernalia about her all over his attic bedroom. In a desperate attempt to bring himself out of the doldrums, he plays his favourite Dolly album. Wham Bam and Alacazam – the country music goddess appears in a cloud of tinsel to do a ‘Mary Poppins’ and change his life. He realises from the get-go that it’s all a self-induced dream, but he’s more than happy to go along with it – and so are we!
Steven Webb and the characterisation he brings to Kevin are joined at the hip. It’s an all-embracing performance so cleverly executed by Webb that you cannot see the join twixt actor and player.
Likewise, the co-writer Tricia Paoluccio who also plays Dolly Parton has her every movement, gesture, singsong word and singsong verse off to perfection. She’s the good fairy of Country come to save Kevin and that’s a dolly good thing.
Supporting this dynamic duo is Aidan Cutler and Charlotte Yorke as backing vocalists and spoken voice artists as and when needed. They pop up mostly on the rooftops and chimneypots above Kevin’s room within the intriguing attic set designed by Paul Wills.
It is directed with care, flair and a rainbow paintbrush by Gabriel Barre. He subtlety introduces Kevin’s broken relationship with his boyfriend, his failure to make it in the fringes of show business and the loss of his (not very special) day job from which he was expecting to be furloughed, but gets sacked instead. Barre makes what could be a ‘slit your wrists’ watch into something that makes the heart strings twang along with the country guitars.
Lizzi Gee adds delicious choreography and Richard Pinner puts another layer to the show with some very clever illusions. With his help, Dolly turns Kevin’s prison into a fun palace.
The musicians Jordan Li-Smith on keys, Alex Akira Crawford on guitar, Ben Scott on drums and and Kevin Oliver Jones on bass make magical music and look cool dudes when they appear on stage during odd moments of Kevin’s Dreamcast.
Being set in Covid makes it personal, bringing back so many memories of not just sanitising everything three times over, hunting for loo rolls and praying for a vaccine, but for those of us who were lucky enough to be hunkered down with partners we loved, it was actually a chance to slow down and re-evaluate our lives. We were of course the lucky ones – many didn’t make it to the other side and I’m not just talking about Covid deaths here – in all honesty I didn’t lose anyone to the virus. I did however lose two single chums who couldn’t stand the isolation and ended their lockdowns badly and sadly. If only they would had a ‘Dolly’ to dance, sing and laugh with.
I do not want to end this review on a down though as it is anything but – Kevin survives and in fact thrives and that for me is the back story that sets ‘Here you Come Again’ into a genre of its own – and yes – I would most definitely come again.
It is so good it leaves you still feeling uplifted the day after.
Here You Come Again runs at Malvern Theatres until Saturday, July 20. Click here for times, tickets and more information.
