REVIEW: Taj Express, Peacock Theatre ✭✭✭

Taj Express

Peacock Theatre,

14th June 2017

3 Stars

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If you missed the superlative ‘Beyond Bollywood’ at the Palladium last year, you could do worse than catch this simpler, humbler offering from the Merchant clan (Vaibhavi, Choreography and Shruti, Director and Producer with Pranav, Executive Producer, and music by Salim and Sulaiman Merchant) in the subterranean lair down Kingsway. No, it’s not the equal of that brand-leader in terms of drama, music, choreography or staging, but Toby Gough’s work-a-day book serves up a revue-style panorama of popular Indian dance styles– keeping it strictly in the family –. There is ‘assistant choreography’ also from Rajitdev Easwardas, Deepak Singh, Tejaswi Shetty, Pratik Utekar and Rahul Shetty).

There are basic projections and some rather more sophisticated lighting designs by Miguel Angel Fernandez, and Alessio Comuzzi pumps out the sound. Inevitably, given the indebtedness of the show to the Indian film industry, there is a great deal of playback, with voices seemingly coming at you from every which way except the direction of the person on stage with the moving lips. Oh, well. That’s budget showbusiness, I guess. There is live improvisation from Prathamesh Kandalkar (percussion) and Avadooth Phadke (flute), and from would-be stand-up comedian Chandan Raina (electric guitar), and that goes some way to redressing the imbalance.

However, plot similarities with ‘Beyond Bollywood’ are sometimes striking: there is a tournee here, a journey through the sub-continent, en route to discover the multi-facetted world of dance, and music. However, while in Argyll Street this was deftly handled, with each departure signalling a very boldly characterised change of image on the stage, here each new musical number seems more and more like what has gone before it and moves us further and further away from any close understanding with the spirit that is driving the show. Possibly, the lack of any central emotional relationship is the biggest obstacle in the path of this journey. The dialogue offers us commentary on the situation, but fails to bring it to life as it goes along; structurally things fare no better, with Gough not distinguishing himself as a master of theatrical construction.

In the leads, Mikhail Sen, Hiten Shah, Tanvi Patil and Denzil Smith exude vitality and eagerness to please, but their needs are so etiolated from everyday experience that it is hard to summon up much enthusiasm for their privileged lives and rarefied concerns. The chorus always does its moves well, and is dressed smartly, but not lavishly.

The missing elements of spectacle and an engagingly simple human story at its heart work against this show connecting with anyone other than die-hard fans of the genre. There were enough present at the Press Night to make a reasonable go of the event, how much that atmosphere will carry over into the rest of the run remains open to question.

BOOK TICKETS TO TAJ EXPRESS AT THE PEACOCK THEATRE