5 January 2025
I first saw Carol Channing – Broadway’s original Dolly from 1963 – at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in New York in 1995. She came out onto the horseshoe walkway around the orchestra and talked to the audience – her audience – for almost 15 minutes at the end of the show. None of us wanted her to leave the stage – and neither did she! Over the stage door had been painted “Through this Door 8 Shows a Week Walks a Living Legend”.
As Mrs Dolly Gallagher Levi, a widow and matchmaker, meddler, opportunist, in her middle years who has decided to begin her life again by finding a match for the miserly “well-known unmarried half-a-millionaire” Horace Vandergelder (but secretly plotting to land him herself as her next husband), it was a role theatrical audiences around the world would forever associate with her in her long career.
I next saw Hello, Dolly! on Broadway at the Shubert Theatre in 2017 with Bette Midler (who would go on to win a Tony) and that production really was an event and the toast of the town. I also saw Bernadette Peters (along with West End star Charlie Stemp making his Broadway debut as Barnaby Tucker) in the same production in 2018.
All three great comedic actors, secure and sublime in their (very different) portrayals of one of the greatest female roles from the golden age of Broadway musicals.
I happily swerved the recent London Palladium version due to a personal aversion to Imelda Staunton and her complete lack of comedic chops – fatal for this role.
I am happy to report that West End star Miss Caroline O’Connor, playing Dolly in Paris in the new English language production at the beautiful Lido 2 on Avenue des Champs-Élysées, is another of the great Dollys of our age.
She leads the company from the front and doesn’t miss a trick, landing every funny line with aplomb in a pitch-perfect performance. Her eyes sparkle and flash with delight and her face literally radiates pure joy. Meanwhile her vocal prowess is perfectly attuned to Jerry Herman’s glorious score. This is a role she was destined to play and she is grabbing it with both hands. How lucky are we to see it!
The production is in the very capable hands of the great Stephen Mear, who won the 2010 Best Theatre Choreographer Olivier Award for his work on Hello, Dolly! at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, and now handles both choreography and direction. And what an absolute joy it is. His well chosen cast really dance up a storm on the open thrust stage at the Lido – especially in the ‘The Waiters’ Gallop’ scene at the Harmonia Gardens, where Mear adds some taptastic tap dancing.
I was worried how they would manage to stage the act 1 closer, “Before the Parade Passes By”, where on Broadway they presented an entire period train. But all it took was a few hat boxes from Miss Irene Miolloy’s hat shop, a trolley and a smoking Top Hat on the head of the tallest dancer to have my heart leaping and my hands clapping with delight – well done set and costume designer Peter McKintosh.
This Lido2 venue itself is absolutely beautiful and unlike anything we have in the UK – it’s an explosion in gold paint, tables and lamps with rows of raised table seats and blood red carpets throughout that match Dolly’s signature red dress. Just make sure you stay seated for the interval when the stage floor disappears and the venue’s permanent fountains spout choreographed dancing clouds of rain illuminated in vivid colours to a stirring accompanying soundtrack.
And the best news? This critically acclaimed season has been extended by a whole month to Sunday 2 February. So what are you waiting for? Get booking your Eurostar ticket and take in a cheeky Paris Saturday matinee and lunch – it is possible to do this in one day without having to stay overnight in the city.
Tickets: https://billetterie.lido2paris.com/fr
