Bronco Billy is one of Clint Eastwood’s ropier westerns, from a time when he was sending up his Man With No Name persona. Released in 1980, in between two comedies where his co-star was an orangutan called Clyde, the film follows a grizzled sharpshooter whose ramshackle wild west troupe provides shelter for a runaway heiress. It’s a screwy caper boosted by the chemistry between Eastwood and Sondra Locke (who were offscreen partners) and eccentric support from his stock company of actors.
This flimsier musical version, with a book by original screenwriter Dennis Hacklin, isn’t short on star quality: the magnetic Tarinn Callender is Billy, his megawatt smile matched by Emily Benjamin’s as heiress Antoinette, while Victoria Hamilton-Barritt wrings delightful detail from the expanded role of Antoinette’s stepmother. All three are brilliantly talented singers – if only they had songs that went beyond these perfectly pleasant, often anodyne numbers about living your dreams by Chip Rosenbloom, John Torres and Michele Brourman.
