Sunset Boulevard review: A bold, ballsy rethink of the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical

To my mind, Jamie Lloyd’s radical redo of Evita at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre in 2019 was a travesty. Reinventing time-worn shows is fine when you have something interesting to say but his take on the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice classic felt like change for the sheer sake of it, logic be damned. When Samantha Pauly’s Eva Peron sang ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina’ on the balcony of the Casa Rosada in her underwear only etiquette prevented me from yelling out “WTAF?” The production trashed everything that was great about the show and I hated it.

Lloyd Webber himself must have loved it, though, because he’s handed Jamie Sunset Boulevard to do with it as he pleases. I’d venture that the score, with lyrics by Don Black and Christopher Hampton, is the composer’s best but a couple of songs have been jettisoned. ‘The Lady’s Paying’ and ‘Eternal Youth Is Worth a Little Suffering’ are both gone for reasons that soon become clear. They’re far too upbeat for the director’s vision of Sunset as a horror story about fame and celebrity, where even the jolly likes of ‘Let’s Have Lunch’ and ‘This Time Next Year’ are infused with pessimism and frustration.

“Scherzinger plays Norma as a deluded Hollywood has-been who could snap at any second”

Literally black-and-white (like the 1950 Billy Wilder film on which the musical is based) until its blood-splattered denouement, the production is a stunner. If little about the Evita rejig made sense, everything here is in service to the story. Stripped of scenery and props, the lush score rises to the fore and the tale of a former star gradually going mad in her mansion is as deeply disturbing as it should be.

Unzipping himself out of a body bag murdered struggling scriptwriter Joe Gillis flashes back to how he ended up in silent movie queen Norma Desmond’s house of horrors and became entranced by her. Which isn’t hard to believe when you have a slinky, seductive Nicole Scherzinger in the lead. From her slow-motion entrance onwards, she’s extraordinary. Glenn Close vamped it up in couture glamour but, in a little black slip with jet-black fingernails, Scherzinger plays Norma as a deluded Hollywood has-been who could snap at any second.

“It’s like a Grand Guignol horror show”

That she blows the roof off with her big numbers ‘With One Look’ and ‘As If We Never Said Goodbye’ is a given. It’s the delicacy with which she sings ‘The Perfect Year’ and the way she slowly, scarily unravels that make the performance so beguiling. Scherzinger’s fearless examination of Norma’s desperate need for fame and recognition feels very now, even if the lyrics reference old Hollywood while the blank-canvas staging makes it a timeless tale of hubris and ego.

Twerking, flirting, and over-acting the dialogue like the silent movie star Desmond once was, Nicole makes some bold choices. But then this is a bold, ballsy rethink. It’s like a Grand Guignol horror show that’s unfolding in Joe’s head. Live cameras zoom in for unflattering close-ups, projected on giant screens. Norma’s butler Max (a scary David Thaxton) is a menacing presence with murky motives. And as Joe, Tom Francis is fantastic – sexy and cynical, with a second-act opener that is so ingeniously staged it gets a standing ovation. It’s a bravura moment in a show that left me shaken and stunned.

Sunset Boulevard is at the Savoy Theatre, London, until 6 January. Get tickets here.