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Oliver! review: A Dickens of a show, writes GEORGINA BROWN

What a difference that exclamation mark made. Lionel Bart reinvented Dickens's great novel Oliver Twist, about grinding poverty, child exploitation and murder,

While still an unashamed love letter to Bart and to a robust, raunchy Dickensian London, the tone is more complex, striking darker notes and, once it gets going, telling a gripping tale which sends shivers down the spine, thanks to Aaron Sidwell’s bloodless, steely, chillingly brutish Bill Sikes. With the revolve working overtime, designer Lez Brotherston conjures up a giddying canvas of glorious, gritty views of London, capturing the boisterous bustle of street life with lovely murky backdrops of the Thames and St Paul’s on the skyline, as well as scenes of quiet cruelty behind closed doors. Director Paige Rattray, corralling a youthful cast, gives the evening the poppy energy it needs, much helped by Ebony Williams’s punchy choreography and Jessica Hung Han Yun’s terrific lighting, designed to make us feel that we’re at a stadium gig.

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