REVIEW: The Nunziata Brothers, Studio 54 Below ✭✭

The Nunziata Brothers

Studio 54 Below

10 January 2015

2 Stars

For some people, life is, as the song exhorts, a Cabaret. Others are content to simply enjoy the art, to let life be pepped up by Cabaret. Both sorts of people are often found in the luxurious room that is Studio 54 Below, and not always on stage performing. It's a wonderful Art Deco space, with a generous raised stage for performers and orchestra/band, fabulous pressed metal ceilings and that plush sense of old fashioned, old world, refined luxury which comes with lashings of red velvet. Acoustically, it seems a dream, but, perhaps inevitably, the sound system ensures that the performers are "helped".

Because it is a functioning restaurant and bar, the performers must compete with the shrill voices of patrons ordering, complaining, offering thanks (or all three at once), the clatter of glass and cutlery and the swishing of service staff. Another reason, one supposes, for the sound system. Still, there is no denying that the clatter of life adds to the sense of specific joy that good Cabaret can inspire.

Tonight, the cabaret in question was an incredibly camp set of numbers from (mostly) Broadway shows delivered by two twins, both gay, both rake thin, both dressed in black (one outfit undeniably more sparkly than the other) and both with voices polished so hard they could be the musical equivalent of the Elgin Marbles - set in stone, unfeeling, lauded by the undiscerning and out of place.

These are the Nunziata brothers, twins Will and Anthony, who, apparently, enjoy great success in America performing with symphony orchestras and in concert mode around the country. This is clear from both the programme of the Cabaret and in the patter during that Cabaret, where plugs for employment are startlingly frequent.

There is no lack of assuredness about the activities of these twins; however, what they lack is a sense of purpose, a Raison d'être, a style, a sense of whole.

Really good Cabaret has a point. It tells a story of some kind: sometimes personal revelations reflected by music choices; sometimes the stories of composers or lyricists; sometimes the high or low points of the career of the artist; sometimes the career of a particular performer or the exemplars of a certain style or genre. But, in the best Cabarets, there is a structure, a purpose, perhaps a revelation.

You would think that with a unique starting point, a pair of glossy, gay twins would be able to formulate a quite remarkable Cabaret. Inherently, their life story must be the stuff of cabaret. Their first realisation about their sexuality and the sexuality of their sibling. The fights, the jealousies, the shared loves, the explorations, the reactions of parents, school days, tricks they played on each other or others, their first show tune love, who likes Judy and who likes Barbra (or whoever), first love - the list of prospective themes is endless.

But the Nunziata twins eschew all that in favour of glitzy schtick. It seems a wasted opportunity. There was only one section, where they described childhood car trips, where there was any sense of their real selves being glimpsed.

One of their song choices, The Age of Not Believing, did provide some insight into their style over substance presentation. These are good looking lads, complete with designer suits, but there is a blandness that infects their work: a sense they are not believing the lyrics they are singing or coming to terms with the sentiments of the music they have chosen. There is no point to doing an arrangement of Children Will Listen that was written for Betty Buckley unless you are going to find a way to make that arrangement work for you. Equally, bad phrasing, a lack of line and tuning problems can diminish enjoyment of music as easily as dead eyes and an over anxious concern for the light. Both twins were on the wrong side of that ledger frequently.

More than anything else, these lads need a ruthless musical director who will focus on their technique and polish what are obviously potentially excellent voices. They need to strive for a higher level of committed performance - and, if they do, and at the same time, use the cabaret experience to open up, they could be a formidable force indeed.

Somewhat predictably, but to good effect, they sang You're Nothing Without Me from City of Angels and the underlying sibling rivalry briefly surfaced. More of that might have served them well. Perhaps a solid go at "Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better" might have helped them break out of the blandness mould. An eclectic song list is simply not enough.