Above : Local production company Little Triangle brought new work ‘Murder She Sang’ to Camperdown venue The Newsagency. Featured image : Caitlin Rose sang impressively in this her cabaret debut. Photo Credit : Shakira Wilson.
Little Triangle brought a slickly packaged and entertaining cabaret to the charming space at The Newsagency in Camperdown this week. It was in the form of the new Australian piece Murder She Sang, transporting us with retro costuming and story into classical femme fatale territory with a fully scripted cabaret and a string of nicely arranged and delivered songs from the twentieth-century songbook.
Creatives Caitlin Rose and Alexander Andrews have conjured up a slice of film noir-ish retro revenge tale in this concept which entertains. The detailed and challenging rapid fire script from writer Hayden Rodgers accurately hurtles us back to the era of arsenic, Secretly dangerous spouses with handguns and racy police investigations of yesteryear.
This new work saluting such times and social structures is a compact but twisting tale. With slick costuming and lovely subtlety of delivery some shocking murderous ambitions are coquettishly
dangled before us from the lethal lying leading lady. The aptly chosen songs always emerge smoothly from the details of the storyline.
Musical accompaniment for storytelling and song moments was in very good hands with Harry Collins at the keyboard. Balance of the amplification at this venue, half-open to an annoyingly noisy foyer may have been more successful with the vocals line at a higher level.
Nevertheless, Caitlin Rose’s interpretation of songs from Sondheim, Rogers and Hart, Coleman and Zippel as well as many other luminaries of musicals and musical environments past was quite a consummate one. It consistently delivered and communicated with variety of tone and gorgeous elaboration of her character.
Accompanist and cabaret honey here worked effectively together here as they made use of the stage, each other’s personas and the link between the story, smooth segues to song lyrics and the
wide range of iconic stylistic features of the chosen music. Visual comedy, nice characterisations and a wealth of musical or vocal tone supported the situations and bold character of the leading
lady.
In this short show without interval the pair ensured the retro romp through larger than life vintage scenarios flavoured by cliché domestic crime
characters was studded with super-satisfying musical moments. These enticed us from an engaging musical style many audience members would not be often exposed to.
The offering was a fine tribute to music and storytelling from racy and tongue-in-cheek twentieth century times. Caitlin Rose’s experienced and solid svelte voice was a suitable once to maintain our interest in the difference of the older song styles.
Rose’s beautifully measured performance of ‘Sooner or Later’ stayed with me for a long time after the cabaret concluded. Her deceptively sweet delivery of all other text and music was engaging. This was one newly crafted cabaret for which modern audiences of any age would do well to pause their modern lives to soak up, celebrating the character and music of the featured era.