Earlsdon Echo [Published February 2024]
Oliver Twist at the Albany Theatre, Coventry.
This latest version of Charles Dickens’ novel is described as “the classic…with a twist. It starts on Christmas Eve, when a group of ex-rogues meet and reminisce about the time when they were members of the notorious Fagin’s gang of pickpocketing kids. However, this framing device is just a swift way of diving headfirst into the plot. The real ‘twist, it turns out, is that this isn’t ‘Oliver!’ – the much-loved musical and film – but something that’s closer to the original book.
This means that, although the mostly local cast don’t get to sing ‘You’ve Got To Pick A Pocket or Two’, they do have a tremendous time.
Dickens created characters that must be a gift to any actor. Coventry-born Paul Nolan’s Fagin is darker and moodier than Ron Moody’s loveable rogue in the film. Cerys Lee-Jones plays the Artful Dodger with cheek and swagger, like a cross between the principal boy in a panto and Rik Mayall’s Captain Flash-heart from Blackadder.
It’s hard not to feel sorry for Pavanveer Sagoo who plays the book’s, and the play’s, least interesting character – Oliver himself. Pavanveer is hindered by being taller than most of the rest of the cast, making his transformation into a quivering child a challenge.
The most impressive thing about this production, though, is the way it manages Dickens’ leaps from comedy to tragedy without missing a step. The first two thirds rely heavily on slapstick. The actors taking it in turns to play villainous Bill Sykes’ dog Bullseye get the biggest laughs.
They’re closely followed by Conor Nolan and Denise Pitter’s bickering Mr and Mrs Bumble, the hilarious grotesques who run Oliver’s workhouse.
But the final scenes [do we need a spoiler alert for a story written 185 years ago?] where Paige Round’s Nancy is killed by Sykes, are genuinely shocking. Instead of happening off-stage the savage beating is portrayed by a Punch and Judy show which, if anything, makes it even darker.
The minor flaw in Oliver Twist – the book – is Dickens love of implausible coincidence. The first couple of times Oliver is taken out to do some robbing, the gang’s victims are, respectively, an old friend of his deceased dad, and then somebody who turns out to be his long-lost aunt. The play whizzes through this with such pace, however, that we don’t really notice.
The only bad news is that Oliver Twist’s run finished at the end of December.
However, the good news is that we’re promised that this is the first of many productions of new, original work at our revamped and revitalised Albany Theatre.