Judy’s return some­thing to talk about
By Talia Carl­isle

Pour the cham­pagne because Judy Gar­land has come to town.

Peter Quilter’s smash hit show End of the Rain­bow opened to loud belly laughs, big smiles and plenty of cheers at the Wel­ling­ton Opera House this week­end.

While the audi­ence and stars were dressed to impress, the show doc­u­mented the beloved The Wiz­ard of Oz Star Judy Garland’s less than spark­ling tur­bu­lence through fame and addic­tion – all wrapped in a bow of beau­ti­ful cos­tumes and spine-tingling songs by a mas­ter­ful band.

This includes the grand­est of grand pianos – with plenty of stage pres­ence giv­en its size- an unfal­ter­ing and at times comed­ic char­ac­ter itself through­out the show’s twists and tan­trums.

Ali Harp­er is sen­sa­tion­al in her trans­form­a­tion into the spark­ling yet troubled song­bird Judy. Ali spans Judy’s rep­er­toire of songs and emo­tions eas­ily, from beau­ti­ful “Blue Skies” to our recog­niz­able high­light of the show – “Over the Rain­bow”, which starts with a mem­or­able cello solo by Nath­an Park­er, and ends with no dry eye in the house.

Ali’s por­tray­al of Judy is monu­ment­ally mov­ing from start to fin­ish. This is eman­ated through her every sound, twitch, and hair tousle, every word, every kiss, and reaches into every heart in every seat of the Opera House.

Best described by a fel­low audi­ence mem­ber – Ali “dis­ap­pears” and in her place Judy is alive before our star-struck eyes. Every joke, every melody and all of her sequined glory absorb the audience’s delight in a vor­tex of beau­ti­ful chaos, that we only have until Sunday to see.

“I can still make you laugh,” Judy says – and she does – let­ting her quick wit and intel­li­gent comed­ic ref­er­ences shine through­out the show. No mat­ter her escal­at­ing money troubles or romantic spats, she can see life for what it is but chooses to find cause for cel­eb­ra­tion.

She doesn’t shy away from any oppor­tun­ity to woo the press or crowd, or a lov­er – steal­ing a kiss and even a man’s pants barely 10 seconds into the show.

Ian Har­man has to be thanked for the effort­lessly chic and sequined cos­tumes that trans­form Judy into the recog­niz­able and spark­ling sen­sa­tion we know and love. Judy’s col­or­ful char­ac­ter is in stark con­trast with the min­im­al and beau­ti­ful set, also designed by Ian.

Ian puts The Ritz into Judy’s glossy hotel room, which magic­ally trans­forms into the flashy hotel stage for her Lon­don per­form­ances every night with the most magic­al of glit­ter­ing light­ing designed by Jeff Hewitt.

Small details give hints as to Judy’s cur­rent and past career state, such as the tini­est grand chan­delier, and her suit­case packed with tow­els “to keep up appear­ances”.

Judy’s sweet and tal­en­ted piano accom­pan­ist, music dir­ect­or and “best friend” Anthony is played by Tom McLeod with charm, humour and unend­ing patience. He sees Judy’s heart, her good­ness, her tal­ent and pas­sion and helps us all in the audi­ence to see it too – all while tick­ling the keys and keep­ing the band in line as the show’s multi-tal­en­ted music­al dir­ect­or.

Glenn Hor­fall plays Judy’s long suf­fer­ing – or long bene­fit­ting – fiance Mickey Deans, with all of the cha­risma, charm and gaiety that Judy is seek­ing in a com­pan­ion. Someone to make light of the dark and drug-filled world she has man­aged to keep hid­den behind closed doors, until now.

“I am the luck­i­est girl alive”, Judy exclaims, just weeks before her untimely death, des­pite her unease at being so far from home in Lon­don, her dif­fi­culties sleep­ing since being force-fed pills as a child act­or, and resort­ing to name call­ing, swear­ing and beg­ging for alco­hol to feel tem­por­ar­ily “her­self”.

Yet, her optim­ism shines through in the darkest of times – cel­eb­rat­ing her Lon­don arrival with tap-water instead of cham­pagne and always a trick up her sequined sleeve.

Even when Judy has no energy left to give, she will find her­self at her hotel room bal­cony, to ensure the town, or the tire­some Port­er (and Assist­ant Stage Man­ager, played by Kev­in Orlando) have some­thing to talk about.

As Judy sings her heart and her soul out into the rafters, it’s hard not to believe that we too will find bet­ter days ahead, some­where over the rain­bow.

As her final songs steal our hearts, again, and the haze of smoke thins, I won­der if the Judy we knew was just that – all smoke and mir­rors.

All I know, is that the real Judy is here, in Wel­ling­ton, and to miss it would be the greatest tragedy of all.