In Nicholas Hytner’s production of Guys and Dolls, nothing stays still for long: not the cast, not the audience, not even the stage. After acclaimed immersive productions of Julius Caesar and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the Bridge Theatre boss turns the auditorium into Depression-era New York, a place that exists in a constant state of flux. Performers dance inches away from the crowd. Audience members are ushered onto tables on the stage. A marching band traipses through the masses. The staging may be inventive, but this production already feels like a classic, knowing when to rock the boat and when to stick to what works. And boy, does it work.
Hanging above the auditorium, bright neon signs point to the seedy underbelly of the city; a world of late nights and men who will gamble over just about anything. Nathan Detroit (Daniel Mays) is desperately trying to find a home for his next illegal crap game, while promising his fiancée of 14 years (girl, run) Adelaide (Marisha Wallace) that they’ll get married any day now. Nathan needs an impossible-to-lose wager and reckons he’s found one when he bets playboy Sky Masterson (Andrew Richardson) that he can’t “take a doll to Havana”, the doll in question being local preacher Sarah Brown (Celinde Schoenmaker).
