Ben Apfelbaum

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST @ THE CAPITOL THEATRE

It was a cold and rainy night that greeted guests at the Premiere of BEAUTY AND THE BEAST.  However, once inside the warmth and charm radiating from the Capitol Theatre stage banished all sorts of dampness and cold.

A lyric from the theme song ‘Beauty  and the Beast’ says that it is ‘a tale as long as time’. This is not quite the case. Gabriella Suzanne Barvot De Villeneuve wrote the fairy tale’ La Belle Et La Bete’ in 1740.

Walt Disney bought the rights in the early 1950’s but could not find a way to make a dark, gothic story in to an appealing, animated film. Over the years the Disney Animation Studios like Pixar dominated the animation  world.

The success of Disney’s ‘The Little Mermaid’ in1990 prompted Disney to take another look at ‘Beauty and The Beast’. With preparatory music written by Alan Menken and lyrics by Howard Ashman it  was decided to employ a screenplay author Linda Woolverton to assist the dying Ashman with his work and it was her idea to make the enchanted castles, crockery and cutlery  sing. For the stage show Tim Rice added some songs.

The story is fairly simple in that a cursed Prince is transformed in to a beast and his servants in to a clock, candelabra, a cup, to name but a few. He must lift the curse by finding true love before the last petal of an enchanted rose falls.

The character Belle is an unusual heroine Disney heroine in that she is not looking for a Prince. She is interested in books and general knowledge.

Shubshri Kandiah as Belle with her sweet soprano truly inhabits the heroine who is non materialistic and spurns vanity believing in higher ideals.

She is the perfect foil for the town ‘hero’ Gaston played by understudy Jackson Head who seamlessly slipped in to the narcissistic. egocentric, muscle kissing bully boy. His magnificent in his over the top , over puffed song ‘Gaston’ where he leaps about the stage with a glorious ensemble cheering on his delusions. As a result Gaston as played by Head with his extreme vanity is very funny.

Belle’s father Maurice is caught in a violent storm and stumbles in to the cursed castle where he is held hostage by the Beast.

Demonstrating her acting ability Kandiah emotes her devotion by rushing through the forest to find her father, played with tenderness by Rodney Dobson.

This is the first time Belle meets the Beast played by Brendan Xavier. He is gruff and angry about Belle’s presence and he releases Belle’s father on the condition that she tays in the castle..

Her imprisonment is ameliorated by  the fact that she meets the Beast’s cursed servants who have transformed in to a clock named Cogsworth  (Gareth Jacobs), a teapot named Mrs Potts (Jayde Westaby) and a candlestick holder named Lumiere (Rohan Browne) and a cup named Chip (Orlando Steiner).

The over anxious Cogsworth, the kindly Mrs Potts and the lighthearted, always optimistic Lumiere win Bell’s trust. Their presence lessons the gloom of the castle.

The scene stealer is Rohan Browne’s Lumiere who camps up his role with a sinewy elegance.  Naturally, he gets sing the razzle dazzle number  ‘Be Our Guest’.

The stage is filled with the entire cast weaving overhead projected patterns, a tribute to the 1930’s choreographer Busby Berkely, mass tap dancing and high kicking like the Radio City Halls Roxettes, all the while with full throated harmonies that rapidly raised the roff of the Capitol Theatre. The audience leapt to its feet in thunderous applause, and this was only Act 1.

As time progresses, Belle sees a spark of humanity behind the Beast.

The chemistry between the couple must be palpable and real and both delightfully share that bond. In a series of comical interludes Belle along with Cogsworth, Lumiere. Mrs Potts and a Vanity Case, played by Elana Tranter seek to take away from his boorish behaviour. Meanwhile the Beast has fallen in love with Belle and is urged by, especially Lumiere,  to engage with her.

Brendan Xavier’s transition from ogre to an unself confident beau to declaring his love for her and him for her is seamless and skilfull.

Mention must be made of the delightful Hayley Martin as the coquettish Babette and Nick Cox as Gaston’s fool.

Matt West’s vision for the choreography and direction was realised by the Australian Resident Director Benjamin Osborne and the Australian Resident Choreographer Emma Delmenico-Smith.

To coordinate and fill the stage with harmonising  singers, kicking and dancing, involved marvellous logistics .

To enchant the audience, Belle’s world must be fully realised .

Scenic Designer Stanley A Meyer achieves this in three different parts.

Belle’s village looks like a children’s storybook illustration, the enchanted forest appeared to me to be digitally created as darkened by flashes of lightning and menacingly drawn wolves leaping and howling over the forest.

The Beast’s castle is almost minimalist in design.

In conjunction with Set Designer Stanley A Meyer, Lighting Designer Natasha Katz has created three curved and twisted ‘candelabras’ which spin around to highlight the various protagonists ,and sometimes join together to form, for example, a staircase.

Music Director and Conductor Luke Hunter, with a mere ten musicians, creates a symphonic, aural landscape which perfectly complements the vocals as well as propelling the action forward.

Sound Designer John Shivers is a strategic partner to Hunter’s orchestrations.

To pay homage to the 1991 animations there are some special and magical effects such as instant costume changes before your very eyes, and the transformations of the Witch, and the Beast who changes in to the handsome Prince.

It is a pleasure to leave a musical where you can hum the tunes ‘Be My Guest’ and ‘Beauty and the Beast’ , sung poignantly an d sweetly by Mrs Potts,  as you leave the theatre.

All the components I have outlined above come together to create a sense of wonder and enchantment.

This musical theatre reaches glorious heights which easily creates feelings of enthralment and sheer delight.

The greatest musicals always contain a moralistic message. Many commentators state that the message is love transforms everything.

I see the message differently, as in this world of internet trolls and war, the victims are demonised. In a multi cultural society where you  meet ‘the other’ harmonious pluralism will be achieved.

BEAUTY AND THE BEAST runs at the Capitol Theatre until 5th November 2023.

http://www.capitoltheatre.com.au

Production photography by Daniel Boud

 

 

Published by Ben Apfelbaum

My photography began when my father handed me the proverbial brownie box camera as a child. As cameras developed I went through Fujica and Olympus range finders graduating to my first single lens reflex camera, the Minolta SRT101, the latter being the greatest facilitator to my growth as a photographer. Digital photography has only added to this. I was a regular contributor to Camera Craft magazine (Australian Camera ) for over three years. During Australia’s Bicentennial year (1988) I made it a personal project to document the celebrations. This culminated in the creation of a book of my photos which was published in 1989. The book was called CELEBRATING AUSTRALIA and came with an accompanying calendar. My works have appeared in a number of publications including the coffee book entitled MY AUSTRALIA (1989), publisher Robertsbridge Severn. This book had a preface by the then Australian Prime Minister Bob Hawke. I was a co-photographer on a book entitled SYDNEY- DISCOVER THE CITY with text written by Robert Treborlang. Major Mitchell Press was the publisher. Also for two years I was the photographer for calendars celebrating Sydney’s multicultural communities. The two calendars were entitled MULTICULTURAL SYDNEY. My work appeared in a group exhibition held at Sydney’s Town Hall pertaining to the diversity of life in South America to raise money for orphanages there. I have over one hundred photos stored in the New South Wales State Library archive. I had a solo exhibition held in 2007 entitled Ben’s Lens at the Sydney Jewish Museum which celebrated the vibrancy of the Sydney Jewish community. Some of these photos are on the Museum’s permanent display. I have exhibited internationally firstly at the Spruill Gallery in Atlanta Georgia, United States, and in an exhibition entitled Kosher and Co at the Jewish Museum in Berlin. Currently I am a regular contributor to J-Wire and this esteemed publication. To celebrate the opening of a permanent Photography Gallery, the State Library of New South Wales selected 400 shots from its archive of over 2,000,000 images to display in the new gallery. An image of mine was plucked out of the multi million photo archive to be part of the inaugural exhibition.