Nicky Gayner
Hooray for Love
The Pheasantry, London, U.K., November 7, 2016
Reviewed by Fiona Coffey for Cabaret Scenes
Nicky Gayner’s highly successful first cabaret show, Empty Nest, was a poignant exploration of life and identity beyond the trials and tribulations of motherhood. Based on a winning concept, its title alone was enough to forge an instant connection between Gayner and the women in her audiences who had shared this experience and were asking, “Is there life beyond the empty nest?.”
Gayner’s follow-up, Hooray for Love, casts the net much more widely—who cannot relate in some way to the theme of love?—but it is arguably a trickier concept to pull off.
Love, after all, is a subject matter so universal and so thoroughly investigated that one might reasonably wonder whether it is possible to take a theme as broad as this, transcend cliché, and find something original to say.
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To the credit of Nicky Gayner and her director, Sarah-Louise Young, Hooray for Love meets this challenge head on with a distinctive, witty, polished and beautifully structured show and proves there is most definitely cabaret life for Gayner beyond Empty Nest. Once again, she displays her gift for storytelling that is highly specific and personal, but nevertheless connects us to experiences that we can all share. Taking us through her dating history, we hear about the boy she wanted, but who was stolen by her best friend. That one subtly chipped away at her self-esteem, the one she’d convinced herself was “the one,” but something just wasn’t quite right. These tales are illuminated by an eclectic and highly entertaining selection of numbers.
Gayner is a striking presence on stage, blessed with great beauty and the wisdom that comes with maturity, yet she is able to convince us that she has been as vulnerable as the rest of us in that troublesome quest to find love. That is no mean feat. Opening the show, making an entrance in an impossibly gorgeous red satin dress with voluminous matching red stole to sing the opening number, “Where in the World Is My Prince?,” one could forgive some audience members for wondering, “What is your problem?” But when Gayner follows this with a simple, touchingly innocent rendition of Victoria Wood’s “Crush,” we begin to accept that Gayner really could have been that 11-year-old schoolgirl aching miserably for that indifferent 16-year-old boy. And, as the evening unfolds, we discover more about her—her thrills and disappointments in love—and that connects us more fully to our own. Plus, Gayner’s anecdotes are peppered with cultural references that locate her story in place and time (including stories of dates in Wimpy Bars that are guaranteed to send British 50-somethings into misty-eyed nostalgia) which add extra pleasure and piquancy to the show.
There are, of course, some very familiar love songs to enjoy. But Gayner is never complacent in allowing the well-loved classics to do the work for her.
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Singing the Carpenters’ hit “Goodbye to Love” in a dressing gown, carrying a box of chocolates, is both great fun and very poignant.
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The “Silly Love Song Medley” is a hilarious and brilliantly crafted mash-up of the cheesiest love songs ever written, so that we can indulge all our guilty pleasures in one go. The set includes good old-fashioned comic numbers: “An Englishman Needs Time” and “Goodness Gracious Me,” alongside heartfelt ballads such as Matt Albers’ “End of the World” and Fran Landesman and Simon Wallace’s “Love Go Round.” I particularly enjoyed Gayner’s version of Carole Bayer Sager/Bette Midler/Bruce Roberts’ “You’re Moving Out Today.” Throughout, her vocal delivery is assured and unfussy in the best sense of the word. She employs expressive, speech-quality singing that communicates each selection with great clarity and emotional truth.
The encore, “All You Need Is Love”/”I’m a Believer,” is beautifully arranged, as everything is, by her M.D. and accompanist Tom Barnes, allowing the beauty and soulfulness of these numbers to be felt before the inevitable segue into a sing-along. And Barnes himself is a revelation: at 22, he must be one of the youngest musical directors in town, but he arranges and accompanies with enormous sensitivity and creativity, and provides an excellent counterpoint to Gayner on stage. That includes singing a couple of duets and contributing to some light-hearted “show moments.” He is definitely someone to watch.
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It was also gratifying to see the age gap between these two performers navigated with grace and class.
Hooray for Love is a delightful cabaret, which showcases Nicky Gayner’s range and confidence as a performer and her willingness to share herself with an audience in a way that is funny, touching and truthful. This is a thoroughly enjoyable and well-crafted show, with a strong narrative arc and broad appeal, providing an unexpectedly thought-provoking journey through a subject we all care about. It deserves every success.
