Reviewed by James Karas
The Shaw Festival’s big musical for this year is Funny Girl, the 1964 musical based very loosely on the life of Fanny Brice (1891 – 1951). The musical has some familiar marvelous songs and an episodic plot about Fanny as she rises to stardom as a singer, comedian and actress.
The musical starts with Fanny (Sara Farb) in her dressing room in the theatre waiting for her husband Nick Arnstein to be released from jail. We then flashback to her life from an ambitious young girl who wants to go on the stage but whose mother Mrs. Brice (Patty Jamieson) tries to dissuade her. She feels that Fanny is not pretty enough to succeed. Mrs. Brice and her friends sing “If a Girl isn’t Pretty” she should get a job and forget the theatre.
Fanny defiantly sings “I’m the Greatest Star” and Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. (Damien Atkins), the great impresario and producer of Ziegfeld’s Follies offers her a job. Fanny proves that she can act and sing as well as inject comedy in her performances. In other words, she is star material.
The musical has a large cast of people on stage but the main ones are singer and dancer Eddie Ryan played by Matt Alfano. Alfano is an excellent singer and dancer and a mensch. He is supportive of Fanny and a decent fellow who helps Fanny. Well done.
Funny Girl ensemble. Photo by David Cooper.
Damien Atkins as Florenz Ziegfeld Jr is a tough man of the theatre but also a smart one. He is furious when Fanny turns a song into a comedy routine but is also smart enough to see a good thing. He helps Fanny’s career enormously.
Patty Jamieson as Mrs., Brice and her poker-playing klatch played by Sharry Flett, Alana Bridgewater and Janelle Cooper are an entertaining asset.
Nick Arnstein (Qasim Khan) is Fanny’s lover and husband and she is waiting for him to be released from prison. He is charming, effusive, generous and a man who wants to become rich. When that proves difficult, he attempts a fast-buck method of fraud. He takes and loses all of Fanny’s money and is convicted of committing fraud. She still loves him but their marriage is not working out.
The musical is well done. The dancers perform Parker Esse’s fine choreography skillfully and the singing is marvelous. Unfortunately, there is a problem with Sara Farb’s voice. At certain points her voice squeaked. When she sang “Rat-tat-tat” with Eddie, Jenny and the ensemble. Her voice squeaked. She gave a superb performance otherwise and the unpleasant sound seemed like an aberration and I can only conclude that she was having a bad afternoon. Funny Girl depends largely on the lead performer and Farb does her job superbly subject to a couple of glitches.
She does excellent work with her singing, dancing and comedy and you want to hear her do “I Want To Be Seen With You Tonight” and “You Are Woman I am Man” , the duet with Nick.
Sets and Costume designs by James Lavoie are exceptional for the various locations and the costumes capture the circa 1930’s styles.
Director Eda Holmes does fine work with the episodic script, the scene changes and the overall pace of the work to give us a splendid afternoon or evening at the theatre.
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Funny Girl by Jule Styne (music), Bob Merrill (lyrics), and Isobel Lennart (book) continues in repertory until October 3, 2026,
at the Festival Theatre, 10 Queen’s
Parade, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario. www.shawfest.com
James Karas is the Culture Editor of The Greek Press, Toronto
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