Miscast Sondheim – Greenside

Stephen Sondheim’s songs are less musical theatre numbers than intricate clockwork mechanisms. Every lyric, every rhythm and every note serves a precise dramatic purpose. Remove one tiny cog and the whole machine begins to judder. That precision makes his work endlessly rewarding, but it also makes it terrifyingly difficult to perform. That challenge sits at the heart of Miscast Sondheim, a revue from LAMDA’s musical theatre ensemble that takes familiar songs from across the Sondheim catalogue and hands them to performers and characters who would not traditionally sing them. The idea is a tempting one. Turn the kaleidoscope a quarter turn and perhaps familiar songs will suddenly reveal unexpected colours. Unfortunately, the picture that emerges is often blurrier rather than sharper. Drawing from the key works of the Sondheim canon, the evening attempts to celebrate reinterpretation and reinvention. Yet the recurring issue is that miscasting a song is not necessarily the same thing as…