A revue of ‘most adven­tur­ous com­poser’ Steph­en Sondheim’s works. Ori­gin­ally per­formed in 1976 the music­als rep­res­en­ted in this revue are from the early part of his career. (Some of the music­als men­tioned in the show’s pro­mo­tion­al mater­i­al do not fea­ture.)  He explores the themes of love, rela­tion­ships, and mar­riage.

Per­formed by Julie O’Brien, Mat­thew Pike, Sarah Line­ham. O’Brien is the stand-out per­former for me on open­ing night. She’s express­ive vocally and makes the cho­reo­graphy (by Leigh Evans) look easy. She’s equally as com­fort­able in slower num­bers, breath­ing the lyr­ics softly over a spell­bound audi­ence. Mat­thew Pike sings as nat­ur­ally as he talks with a lovely tone. He is cap­able of jux­ta­pos­ing sweet with con­temp­tu­ous. Sarah Line­ham had prob­lems with her micro­phone on open­ing night which popped and crackled dur­ing the entire ener­get­ic first half. She finally men­tioned it which made us laugh but it must have been hor­rible on stage too. Hope­fully this hasn’t put her off too much. Music­al Dir­ect­or Michael Nich­olas Wil­li­ams is joined onstage by Colin Taylor. They get to take part in the shenanigans on stage with some quirky little asides while provid­ing music­al accom­pani­ment on the pianos. Lisa Maule is Light­ing and Set design­er. The set is simple which leaves ample room for dan­cing. The lights really help to set and change moods, and to focus our atten­tion on what’s hap­pen­ing next. Dir­ect­or Emma Kin­ane gives us a fast and funny first half. The second half is a bit uneven although that’s more dic­tated by the songs rather than the per­form­ances.

Sond­heim has been writ­ing and com­pos­ing for many years. This music­al cel­eb­rat­ing the 40th anniversary of Circa Theatre’s ori­gin­al pro­duc­tion was both fun to watch and sparked a post-show con­ver­sa­tion about favour­ite shows and per­formers.