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Desmond Barrit bellows out the opening number, 'Comedy Tonight' in what James Joyce called a "bass barreltone". As proceedings continue, one grows to suspect that singing ability was not uppermost in director Edward Hall's mind when casting (pace stage-musical stalwart Philip Quast).
Along with this suspicion, however, grows the conviction that it does not matter. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum is a farce with songs, albeit that the songs are by Stephen Sondheim; what counts is the way Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart mix together several 2200-year-old plots by Plautus into one delightful, pell-mell heap.
© The Financial Times Ltd.