Is it a musical or is it a play with songs? It’s a moot point and one worth considering because this bright and enjoyable show falls between two stools. In 1984, the late Mustapha Matura exported JM Synge’s The Playboy of the Western World from rural County Mayo to a similarly sleepy Trinidad in Playboy of the West Indies. Now, composers Clement Ishmael and Dominique Le Gendre, co-directing with Nicolas Kent, have given Matura’s version a calypso overhaul, complete with a band in the pit.
There is lots to love about it. Leading a tremendous cast, Durone Stokes is all politeness and charm as Ken, the blow-in to small town Mayaro, whose murderous tale – he claims to have bumped off his father – thrills the local people for its audacity. Stokes is relaxed and centred, making it easy to see why men and women alike should fall for him. He is cautious rather than boastful, lending credence to his story.
He is matched in assurance by Gleanne Purcell-Brown as Peggy, serving the rum in a wooden shack that looks as if it has drifted in with the tide on Michael Taylor’s set. She is a woman certain in her desires – and she desires the scruffy excitement of Ken considerably more than the besuited stiffness of Derek Elroy’s Stanley.
They sing with purity and lack of affectation, making their duets all the more sweet on songs such as the lilting I Will Always Be Thinking of You and the pretty We Will Fly. Although the score has the expected ensemble numbers with mambo rhythms and steel-drum textures, it frequently takes a less obvious route past reflective solos with spare arrangements, as if resisting the impulse to please the crowd.
Adding music infuses the piece with a feel for the cultural life of the island but it raises two concerns. First, this is a story that plays on the allure of the mysterious outsider, but as soon as Ken shares his thoughts in song, he ceases to be enigmatic.
Second, the songs tend to extend each emotional state, which is pleasing in the moment, but has the effect of slowing the comic momentum. Instead of the economy of a musical, we get a play padded out with songs.
• At Birmingham Rep until 2 July.
