Jekyll and Hyde at the Old Vic review: Toe-tappin’ fun, if a little shallow
The Old Vic | ★★★☆☆
Much is unfamiliar in this dance adaptation of Jekyll and Hyde – the lurid suits, the jazzy score, the fact that Jekyll is reimagined as a doctor of botany.
That there’s little tying the production to RL Stevenson’s source material is testament to the enduring power of Dr Jekyll, a character who’s broken free from his story. Stevenson’s gothic geography is replaced by the physical furniture of 1950s musical theatre.
It’s set in London, though it could just as easily be New York, with the big-band and the actors’ playful interaction with the set giving it a Guys and Dolls flavour. The plot is also completely overhauled; the famous twist removed, the ending altered and a love interest (Rachel Muldoon) introduced.
Prodigiously talented choreographer Drew McOnie also directs here, saying his inspiration came from the balletic potential of Jekyll’s transformation. These scenes are excellent, with the outstanding Daniel Collins (Jekyll) conveying the bodily anguish of metamorphosis without resorting to cliché.
Where his Jekyll is represented by MGM-style songs, Tim Hodges’s Hyde has a heavy lead-guitar soundtrack, and while he never quite hits the malevolent pitch of Stevenson’s Hyde, his athleticism neatly conveys the character’s carnality.
There’s no faulting the superb choreography, but McOnie’s direction isn’t yet its equal, with some scenes confusing or tonally jarring, especially an ill-judged boxing scene and a baffling flower-juggling contest.
Grant Olding’s score, meanwhile, washes waywardly over proceedings, sometimes electrifying but too often limiting the dancers’ scope for interpretation.
If there’s a message to be teased out of Stevenson’s novella, it’s that a Dr Jekyll can’t exist without a Mr Hyde. The latter isn’t created anew by the former; he’s bisected from him, a simplified half of a complex whole. This production loses this subtlety; Jekyll’s transformation is more about getting the girl than battling immoral compulsions. It’s fun, if a little shallow.