GUYS & DOLLS
The Bridge Theatre, London

THIS immersive revival of the classic ’50s musical Guys & Dolls knocks it out of the park. 

So immersive is director Nicholas Hytner’s unique staging that you’d be forgiven for mistaking it at times for a Punchdrunk production, a forerunner of the genre.

Those with so-called “promenade” tickets are allowed to roam the stage floor at will, intermingling with the actors who portray the various gamblers, gangsters, drunks and dancers of the 1930s New York underworld.

A gangster leans over your shoulder one minute, while a marching missionary band threads its way through the crowd the next.

Coppers stalk the floor, sometimes giving you an ominous glare but chiefly to usher those straying too close to an emerging thoroughfare or gangway that suddenly rises from the ground.

That’s because Bunny Christie’s set design is constantly on the move — at times the stage rises high above those standing, while at others all the action is played out at ground level.

The resulting effect is somewhat carnivalesque and attention, for better or worse, can easily be diverted away from the main action to some minor detail.

Others not wishing to stand for nearly three hours can opt for one of the encircling seats in this theatre in the round.

Frank Loesser’s musical centres around the story of hapless gambler Nathan Detroit (Daniel Mays) and his mission to raise “the 1,000 bucks we ain’t got” to pay a garage owner to host “the oldest established, permanent floating, crap game in New York,” as the song goes.

He then plots to make the money by proposing a bet he (apparently) can’t lose to high-stakes gambler Sky Masterson (Andrew Richardson): to take straight-laced missionary Sarah Brown (Celinde Schoenmaker) on a date to Havana.

The musical’s old-fashioned gender roles may not not have stood the test of time, but what still makes it so beloved is its host of colourful characters, all brimming with comedic charm.

There’s the roguish Harry The Horse (Jordan Castle), the giant Big Jule (Cameron Johnson), a pitch-perfect Nicely Nicely Johnson played by Cedric Neal, and of course Detroit’s long-suffering fiance of 14 years, Miss Adelaide, performed tougher-than-usual by Marisa Wallace.

The work’s titular number, which tells how one man buys his wife a ruby with his union dues while another pays all kinds of rent for a flat that “could flatten the Taj Mahal” — as “the guy’s only doing it for some doll” — may be a somewhat crude insight into love by today’s standards, but it still brings the house down.

A dance-off free-for-all at the end of the show makes for a fitting finale to a truly innovative take on this Broadway vintage.

Guys & Dolls runs at the Bridge theatre in London until September 2. Box Office: 0333 320 0051, [email protected]