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Musical of two halves
MUSICAL: FAILED STATES
Pleasance Theatre
FAILED States, a musical based on Kafka’s not so paranoid classic The Trial about a man, Joseph K, who is imprisoned for reasons unknown to him, is, to use a football cliché, a game of two halves.
The first half brings to mind words such as simplistic and blunt.
The humour attempts to be satirical but isn’t clever enough and the frequent songs diffuse all the serious points the play is trying to make.
It doesn’t help that said points are nothing we haven’t read in a million newspapers. The feeling is that is doesn’t know whether it wants to be a comedy, a musical or a commentary.
But in the second half the piece redeems itself admirably.
This is not to say the acting or direction was poor in the first half.
The two leads are strong throughout, with Joseph K sneaking it on the acting stakes but his wife giving the entire cast a pummelling when it comes to singing.
Also the rotating set, which in the first half seemed to be being used because it was there, is put to greater dramatic effect in the second. And the songs, which previously sounded almost identical with their metronomic beat, suddenly become individual and relevant to the drama.
Until Nov 12
020 7609 1800
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