Well, that was exhausting. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s adaptation of the iconic 1939 musical film fantasy is a relentlessly professional piece of entertainment, with the feelgood sentiment bolted on. Georgina Onuorah’s full-throated, tough-cookie Dorothy yomps through a steampunk 1950s version of Oz that also has overtones of contemporary late-stage capitalism, mostly created through back projection and garish costumes.
Shay Barclay’s choreography has a martial air, the cast gunning us into submission with their rictus grins and front-stage flick-flacks. There’s not much space for characterisation or vulnerability among the leads. It all feels a bit hollow beneath the shiny exterior, like the Tin Man’s chest cavity. But, as I said of Lloyd Webber’s Joseph also at the Palladium before Covid: resistance is useless.
