Our Lady of Kibeho at Stratford East: Super Interesting Story, Super Uneven Tone

It’s Theatre Tuesday! We get an extra day to talk about theatre this week because ‘Bayside! The Musical’ opens tonight at The Other Palace in London but closes Saturday! 
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​“Bayside is a school that’s cool and you know that it’s true! The girls are the cutest and the guys are the hippest too – oooh ooh ooh!!!” If that means anything to you – or better yet, if you heard it with Zack’s lemon juice-afflicted squeaking – then ‘Bayside! The Musical’ is the fun, silly as heck romp meant especially for you. If you have no idea what’s going on, you might enjoy seeing this new-to-London show, but not nearly as much. Unless you like truly vulgar, over-the-top raunch; then you will also like it a lot.

 ‘Bayside! The Musical’, presented by National Lampoon productions, sillily lampoons the American national treasure ‘Saved by the Bell’ and the goofy characters we know so well. It opens tonight after a weekend of previews, which I saw the first one of. Seeing it is like being with old friends from childhood who you just want to mock mercilessly. And hoo boy, is it merciless. Created by Bob and Tobly McSmith (no typos in there, p.s.) (I know) (Tobly) (Tobly) (I can’t stop saying it) (the word has lost all meaning), ‘Bayside!’ focuses its semi-well-meaning ridicule on the aspects of the show that made no sense and suggests new takes on the show that make so much sense – like Slater being gay and in love with Zack. Perfection!
 
Showing this week at London’s The Other Palace Theatre in the Victoria section of town, ‘Bayside!’ is downstairs in the Studio, which I never knew existed despite having been to TOP like 50 times. It’s a tiny crowded black-box style room, with a tiny stage that has barely enough room for the prop ‘table’ (it’s a piano that goes unused) let alone for sets. The actors enter and exist through the aisle between audience members. It’s open seating (first come first get the best seats) and there’s a bar like right there. So, all of this adds to the very informal vibe of ‘we’re seeing high schoolers put on this little show they worked on so hard all semester’. And of course no, this is professional, but if you pretend it’s by high schoolers it’s a lot more impressive.
 
Regardless of how amateur it seems (and many of the actors’ skills do reinforce that impression), it doesn’t really matter. If you just watched a few eps of ‘Saved by the Bell’ when you were young, you’ll be all in for all the inside jokes and references that remind you of how bonkers this sitcom was, especially considering it was meant for children, and you’ll have a blast. The cast includes actors for each of the main 6 – Zack, Kelly, Slater, Jessie, Lisa, Screech – plus two ‘extras’ who play all the other necessary parts (Belding, Tori, Chief Henry’s ghost) and are truly the most impressive and most hilarious of the bunch. Their improved-seeming vamps during scene changes are some of the funniest parts. Ben Campbell (a great Zack) is the only American in the bunch so there were some odd attempts at the accent but I didn’t even care I was having such fun.
 
This parody is indeed a musical, and while you might be expecting to hear international Grammy-winning hits by the Zack Attack, or more of those school songs like I began with, they’re all original tunes, like about how Kelly is poor or about how there’s nothing sexual about the girls’ sleepover. They’re not great songs, and the lyrics often get tired, but they’re funny and their foundations are clever. Oh there is one familiar song, of course – Hot Sunday’s “Get Down and Break a Sweat”, which even in a parody show can never be as hilarious as seeing the real thing. Although, it was a nice touch to comment that yes, this pointless music video, clearly occurring just to show the girls in their underwear, did indeed air during Saturday morning children’s programming.
 
The best part by far was its take on two specific characters. The first is playing AC Slater as not only gay, but super raging into Zack, always trying to get Preppy into compromising situations – like he gets when he wrestles, which is why he’s the star wrestler. Every single line out of Slater’s mouth would be something dirty directed at Preppy. Almost as genius was the roadkill-looking wig the actor was wearing to resemble the young Mario Lopez. But the best take on a character, and the best most brilliant aspect of the show by far, was their portrayal of Tori Scott. Those real fans out there will remember Tori as the new girl character introduced during the ghost season – a season with absolutely no sense of time or space as relating to the other seasons, with no regard to what had happened before or where the kids were in school by this time (hint: they had already graduated), and with no mention of what happened to Jessie or Kelly, who had left the show after their characters graduated in the previous season. You know, you think ‘high school show’, you think ‘out after graduation’, so Tiffani and Lizzie bounced, but the Tori years, my goodness, were just like they were back in a second go at junior year, with proms and everything. It was amazing, and the best part was that Tori was kind of butch and badass and honestly was the Slater that Mario Lopez, and the creators, wished he could be. So of course ‘Bayside!’ had the male extra actor play Tori – a lot – by throwing an enormous blonde curly wig on and speaking with an even deeper voice than his real one. Also, this Tori had a parole officer and a bad past, and she frequently referred to her needing to score dope (but there’s no hope with dope!). It was BRILLIANT and honestly that portrayal, by William Hazell, is my top reason why fans should go see this show. I’m cracking up just thinking about it.
 
Another worthy take on a character was that of Violet, the super nerdy girl that Screech falls for, or that falls for Screech really, during the chorus-focused episode (The One Where They’re All Suddenly in Chorus). Violet was played by Tori Spelling because her dad owned everyone and everything and one day she was like ‘Daddy I want to be on ‘Saved by the Bell’ all my friends watch it’ and Aaron was like ‘ugh okay but you’re so annoying that I’m going to make you a love interest for Screech’. So this Violet, played by female extra Roann McCloskey (I want to say one of the few who could carry a tune?), wasn’t referred to as Violet but as Tori Spelling, because that’s really what it was, just Tori Spelling wanting to be on TV. It was a little bit overplayed (she’s in this production A LOT for someone who I think had just one episode! (memorable though it may be)), but still pretty funny overall.
 
One part that wasn’t overplayed and I wish they did more with it was having Lisa not know that she’s black. She never ever talks about it and no one ever mentions it on the show; it’s as whitewashed as possible while still having the actress be black. It sort of makes sense, because Lisa was originally supposed to be a JAP from Long Island (omg can I just say I am SO HAPPY that she wasn’t; can you imagine having to deal with the awful stereotypes that the shitty writers would have constantly repeated?) and so after Lark Voorhies was cast the lazy writers didn’t really change too much about the character although they were ‘supposed’ to alter her a little. So her blackness was ignored, not out of a sense of ‘oh her friends don’t see color’ but more of a ‘oh let’s just pretend she has no cultural identity of her own.’ So here, they comment on that near-erasure by having someone tell Lisa that she’s black and having her react to it. Oh my god this was hilarious and they could have done sooo much more with it. Her rap about white people things is good, and just made me want to see more as this was the one almost-sophisticated take about the whole show.
 
Like the jokes, the musical numbers have glimmers of brilliance but can get a little wearisome. They repeat a lot of the lyrics over and over and lose the humor that way. But the brilliant parts are what I’ll remember. The funniest song is when Kelly blithely sings about ‘Trapper Keeper Boner Hiders’, as all the boys in school have to carry their famous ‘90s binders when they see her. And my favorite rhyme in the whole show is the Act I closer, when they ask “Will Zack and Kelly be reunited? Will Jessie be…so excited?” As expected, there is a lot, maybe too much, about Jessie’s infamous caffeine pill addiction, but come on, you can’t NOT talk about that when the topic of ‘Saved by the Bell’ comes up. The most genius use of this storyline happens to be my favorite part of the whole show – but one that not many people understood, which is so sad to me as a musical theatre fanatic. So Jessie is up there on the dark stage all alone, with just a single spotlight illuminating her. The music starts to vamp, a very familiar measure of music, and Jessie quietly sings ‘Why did I do it…’ and I CACKLED. I laughed so loud and hard that people turned to look at me, people who OBVIOUSLY aren’t musical theatre fans or they would have recognized that part of Rose’s Turn from ‘Gypsy’ and joined me in recognizing how brilliant it was to use this here. SO BRILLIANT! I can’t get over it. It’s too bad the actress playing Jessie wasn’t too strong of a vocalist because I mean this is the pinnacle of musical theatre numbers and it’s kind of mean to give it to someone who is weak but still oh man this was the best ever.
 
Although I laughed regularly the whole time, this extra-hysterical reaction of mine was matched, almost, by one other part of the show. At the end, Screech gets struck by lightning and predicts the future. He says Jessie will do a movie that ‘shows her boobies’ and destroy her career (true), Zack will date a homeless girl (also true), and then he turns to Lisa and says ‘YOUR FACE IS GOING TO MELT OFF.’ Oh my god I died! If you have seen a picture of Lark Voorhies in the past decade you know why this is so funny and so unbelievably mean. It’s awful but I can’t stop laughing! Lisa looks concerned and says ‘my face?’ and Screech continues ‘Yes. Your face is going to melt off, it’s going to melt right off of your body.’ I couldn’t breathe.
 
All the fun and clever bits are sometimes overshadowed by the vulgar sex jokes, which are funny at first when you have a show this silly but it really truly goes overboard. We were the youngest people in the audience and there were all these stuffy white-haired British people sitting there and listening to really disgusting descriptions of the most crude stuff you could ever imagine and it was suuuupes aaaawk. Some of it was funny, but a good 70% of that material could be cut and the show would be better for it. There’s so much brilliance to mine in mocking this show as is; there’s no need to resort to penis jokes every other minute.
 
But as I shared above (oh, spoiler alert retroactively sorry), there’s plenty of hilarity going on, and fans will rejoice at an endless treasure trove of references. There’s Zack constantly stopping time with his ‘Time-outs!’, there’s Screech dressing as an old lady and having noooo one question that he is one, as happened on the show more than once. There’s shout-outs to Chief Henry (remember when Zack befriended an Indian chief?????) and Miss Bliss. There’s constant talk about how Kelly is poor, like so much. And there’s even a comment about the gang going to Hawaii, where Kelly’s grandfather lives. Remember that nonsense?? When for four or so episodes the whole gang just up and went to Hawaii for like a month? Because Kelly’s grandfather owned a hotel there? And Kelly fell for a lawyer who was trying to steal her grandfather’s business even though she was what 17 at best and the lawyer had to be at least 25 and NO ONE EVER MENTIONED how this was illegal??? Ahhhhhhhh! OMG I just found out that Kelly’s grandfather was played by Dean Jones! Dean Jones as in the original Bobby in Sondheim’s ‘Company’! Oh man writing about this show is taking me on such a roller coaster of emotions I really must stop.
 
‘Bayside! The Musical’ would have benefited from a good edit, but it’s overall such a funny parody of our beloved sitcom that it’s worth seeing, especially if you remember watching the show more than 20 years ago (I know) and being like, ‘wait, what?’

 
“How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying” is one of those old Broadway musicals from just after the Golden Age (1961) that I always forget I like. Fun fact: I saw Daniel Radcliffe on Broadway in the 2011 revival of “How To Succeed In Business Without Really Trying” (a ‘Birdman’ long title which I will from here on out refer to as H2$) TWICE. I mean I liked Harry Potter fine but I wasn’t a fangirl of Big D until this show. I really can’t believe I saw it twice lol. He was GREAT. That’s not important right now. Funner fact: When Husband learned that the venue around the corner from our flat was doing a small production of H2$, of course we went, considering it is around the corner from our flat, but I completely forgot that I knew the show and that I kind of loved it and that I had seen it enough times for me to memorize pretty much all the lyrics. I just thought, hey sounds fun, I like seeing theatre and we should support the smaller productions in London too. All I remembered really was that there was some hefty ‘60s-era misogyny that we should take with a grain of salt because of when it was written, or as I explained to my friend who came along, “It’s really sexist but in kind of a lovely way.” 

We walked the ten seconds to Wilton’s Music Hall and the show began and I literally slapped myself in the face with the metaphorical hand of memory and was like OH YEAH I LOVE THIS SHOW. Wilton’s production is obviously smaller than the Broadway one (and I could move my chair! like on Alitalia), with less exciting dancing, but what’s there is hilarious and so well done. They successfully mine the book and score for every single sarcastic, cutting drop of humor that I think it’s the funniest production of H2$ I’ve seen. I laughed so hard throughout, especially at every slight movement Matthew Whitby made. It was an extraordinarily self-aware production, like they realized the material was sexist and lily white and stuff and so presented it as mocking itself a little. I think a lot of this is in the original book anyway – you can’t have a song called “A Secretary is Not a Toy” (omg I accidentally typed Tory first hahaha I hope none of your secretaries are Tories (I hope none of you are Tories) (please don’t let them win)) and not have the sardonic bite built into the actual show – but I never really noticed it until this production. And I never knew it won the Pulitzer Prize, and sexist things can’t win prizes (or positions of power?) so of course it had to be tongue-in-cheek right? 

So what is the actual show about? As I explained to Husband beforehand, “It’s like this guy, and he like charms his way up a company ladder, and it’s like ocean colors?” I remembered that from the 2011 set, what can I say. Also apparently I say like a lot in real life. So what is it really about now that my brain is working? J. Pierrepont Finch, a charming young man who works as a window washer, realizes ‘hey, I can’t be a window washer with this name, not that there’s anything wrong with being one, but my name was clearly made to be attached to a man of great stature at a Fortune 500 company, otherwise what a waste, also it would help matters along if I were British because who else has a name like that, but I can’t change that now, so we’ll try to get a corporate job and because I’m American I’ll just go by Ponty because Americans could never abide a first-initial-legit-ridiculous-middle-name combo on anyone but S. Epatha.’ Okay that’s my thought process not his, but the gist is there. (Oh my god I never until now wondered what the J is for. Any guesses??) Ponty wants a big time corporate job like most white men do (and how!) so he goes into the office building for the World Wide Wickets Company (hilarious made-up business that has the side effect of reminding you of the bar exam (so many widgets/wickets questions)) and just straight up starts charming people into a job and up the ladder consistently and swiftly. It’s a good lesson that it doesn’t matter what your skills are as long as people like you. 

As Finch (I can’t say Ponty too much or my stomach starts to hurt), Marc Pickering played the character differently from both Radcliffe and Matthew Broderick (back when he was appealing onstage and not a wooden statue but I digress). His Finch was a smooth charmer of course, but in a much subtler way, and with a more devious, scheming vibe. Finch is always scheming, but other portrayals have had him be a little more cheerful and pleased when his scheming pays off, like in every single scene when he gets promoted over someone else or orchestrates someone else’s firing because of something he knew or did. Others’ reactions have been like ‘cheeky smile – ah ha!’ Marc was more like ‘side eye half smile- YEAH BITCH I DID THAT YOU DARE MESS??’. He was charming but also aloof. And a little scary. It all worked. He looked just like a young Pee Wee Herman who could also have been a Newsie when he was little and I don’t mean that at all in a mean way.

The show starts with Ponty weasling his way into an entry-level position by alluding to the head of HR that he knows the boss. That’s a really good real-world tip. The opening number “How To Succeed” with those weird intervals sounded a lot nicer than I remembered, so bravo. In the five seconds it takes for Finch to land this job, a secretary named Rosemary falls for him because why not/’60s and sings the song I had been singing in jest to my husband the whole week prior, “Happy To Keep His Dinner Warm”. My god I still can’t get over how funny it is that there is a song called this, literally about how a lady would be content to make her husband’s dinner and then keep it warm when he works late. It’s amazing. If you take it with a grain of salt. Hannah Grover’s Rosemary is lovely and manages to get to through the song without breaking and screaming about how we have to topple the patriarchy, as I would have done. More impressively, her mic was having a fit throughout her big song, which is such a shame (that I hope the tech people have sorted by now), but she didn’t even flinch, whereas I would have probably screamed ‘WTF IS GOING ON’ and ruined everyone’s night, so brava. 

As usual, the comic song “Coffee Break” goes on way too long, as all jokey songs/jokey anythings tend to, but the choreography was pretty funny. Luckily, before I could worry, it leads into my favorite song that, again, I completely forgot was in this show, “The Company Way”. Finch, in the mailroom, gets to know the head of the mailroom (Richard Emerson, who plays all the older man parts aside from the boss and is hilarious in all of them), who describes how he has lasted this long in the company by always playing it safe and toeing the company line. It’s a delightful, catchy song that I haven’t been able to get out of my head all week, and the delivery of all Emerson’s little lines was spot on. I love this scene. We also meet our villain, as all adorable preppy blond boys are, Bud Frump, the boss JB Biggley’s nephew who uses nepotism to try to advance his career. Okay, I know you are rolling your eyes – Frump? F-ing BIGGLEY? But take a deep breath because I’m about to blow your mind. These character names were not made up for this production in response to the current ruin of America. These are the real names from the original 1961 production. I KNOW!!! I think 90% of the audience, tittering when they heard these names like I am tittering at the word tittering, thought they were added for this. See musical theatre is always relevant!

As Bud Frump, Daniel Graham is wonderfully exasperating and annoying as he is supposed to be, and it’s almost hard to hate such a cute person in such cool glasses (he looked exactly like Christopher Hanke to me, from the 2011 revival). It was extra hard to remember that the names were not changed for this production when Bud continuously whines about how he should get what he wants because his uncle is the boss and who cares if he’s qualified if he wants something. So on point. As for the other fair-haired adoraboys in the cast, I don’t even remember Mr Bratt in the H2$ Bway revival but the aforementioned Matthew Whitby f-ing SLAYED me. How he managed he make such a nothing character into the funniest performance ever boggles my mind. He did a lot of amazing side glances and had hysterical comic timing. But more than that, it was his footwork. He seemed to be in a ballet that the rest of the cast didn’t always know about, step-ball-changing and pirouetting around the stage. I was dying. We all were. When he came in to do a scene change dressed as a maid for no good reason, my god. Whose idea was this? So ridiculous and so funny. All the choreography was great, actually. There were no really big booming dance numbers, but all the movement had a clear purpose and was very effective. And so much of it was really funny. I would not be surprised if the choreographer was really a comedian. 

Despite the first act being over an hour and a half long (I KNOW), it pretty much flew by with very few low points. I think the pacing could surely be improved a great deal (I do not remember any other production being this long) but there’s not much that’s noticeable. The song at the end of Act I “Rosemary” is too long for being literally just her name repeated ad infinitum, but that’s more OG problems. The scenes with Biggley (Andrew Wadsworth) and Hedy La Rue (Lizzii Hills why are there two i’s I’m genuinely curious) kind of dragged but that’s because those are two kind of thankless characters. I know everyone familiar with this show is aghast at what I just said and shouting ‘but they’re literally 2 of the like 4 main characters’ and I know but still, there’s not the ones we root for. They did a fine job of course and were enjoyable. But you spend the whole show actively rooting for Finch to trick Biggley at every turn, so it’s not like you invest in him or his own story (and the only thing that’s really his own is his affair with Hedy). And Hedy’s whole thing is that she prances about being an attractive bimbo who knows every man wants her, and so unless you are Tammy Blanchard waddling hysterically around the stage and making killer faces, it is a little thankless. Lliizzii did however manage to make us cry with laughter in her first scene, when she apologizes because “it was I whom was late”. Died. And Biggley’s big goofy number with Finch where they sing the Old Ivy fight song was hilarious too. Okay fine they were all great. The whole cast was. Geri Allen was an adorable Smitty. I always lose it when Smitty comes in during “Paris Original”, and Geri nailed how funny that moment should be. Maisey Bawden as Miss Jones was good too, although it seemed like she wasn’t miked at the end and it was hard for her big verse in “Brotherhood of Man” to be as show-stopping as I could tell up front that it could have been. And Nuwan Hugh Perera, who we last saw in the supes creepy “Side Show”, was solid all-around until the end when he was like shimmying in a corner of the stage and we were DYING. So f-ing funny. God everyone in this cast was hilarious and made this show so much fun. We were all seriously in stitches the entire time. That’s so rare and awesome.

And the score! How could I have forgotten how much fun this score is? Why was the song about keeping dinner warm the only one that stuck before? I so love “The Company Way” like I said, but every song is special in its own way. “A Secretary Is Not A Toy” I mean COME ON. I wonder if they know about this song over at Fox News. Someone should send them a recording. And I love “I Believe in You”, when Finch gears himself up for his big meeting and the rest of the company men dream of taking him down. This song was staged in the men’s bathroom, which is a preposterous and amazing idea. Finch is singing to himself in the mirror and using the urinal and stuff and then the rest of the men are watching him and also using the urinals like at least 4 times and singing about how they’re gonna stop him coooold and you’re like how do you already have to pee again you should see a doctor! So good. And nothing gets you as pumped up as “Brotherhood of Man”, even if you are a woman. It’s set up nicely in the scene, with all the company men coming to a face-off about who to blame for the problems Finch has caused. Emerson was hysterical here doing a crazy heavy ‘New York’ accent as the chairman of the board who also used to be a window washer. When he said ‘window washer’ it sounded like he had cotton in his mouth and we were crying. He really sounded just like my South Philly Italian uncle. So good. Finch gets out of the jam by pointing out their shared humanity – being men – which is so dumb and perfect. “Brotherhood of Man” is a joyous, satisfyingly big number that you can’t help but smile throughout. I can’t wait to sing it to my baby nephew when I teach him the responsibility of his white male privilege and all the perks he can look forward to, as the song teaches us. 

Honestly, my expectations for this production were seriously low. I knew nothing about this production and thought it was going to be some tiny nothing at the nearby jazz hall. That it was so sublime and kept all of us grinning wildly for 3 hours is something I never would have predicted and am really grateful for. SO MUCH FUN. It ends its short run Saturday so if you are in London you should absolutely see it. Compared to the West End, tickets are cheap, yet the quality of the production is so high. It’s a guaranteed good time so you should definitely go and then I dare you not to sing all the songs all day long.