Opening night at the SpiegelGardens felt like the perfect way to kick off our Brighton Fringe season. So, on the back of a glorious sunny day, we headed full of excitement to the Wundabarn, a delightful wooden structure with seating in the round.
We were there for Chocolate Box Theatre’s C’est Magnifique, a lively, comedic cabaret extravaganza of song and dance performed with gusto by a cast of six, along with two providing live music on the keyboard and drums.
On entering, you’re completely transported to 1930s Berlin and the whole performance is reminiscent of the Kit Kat Club in Cabaret. One of the musical’s numbers even makes an appearance, although we won’t spoil it for you by naming which one. They cover a variety of music genres from pop to musical theatre that will have you singing along before you know it.
The highlight for us had to be the quality of the singing. The entire cast had wonderful voices and their harmonies were spot on. There was one particular song near the end that almost brought a tear to our cold, dead eyes – no mean feat! Considering they were all singing live in what is essentially a small wooden doll house (albeit a very pretty one), the acoustics were surprisingly good.
Having said that, there were a few sound issues and a couple of the performers forgot their lines, but this only added to the joyous, comedic feel of the act. We’ll put it down to first night niggles – in no way did it detract from the overall performance.
Special mention to Conor Baum as Cyril the emcee and Nathan Potter as Gaylord, who, in our opinion, completely stole the show.
There are multiple shows on throughout the festival (and a special one not to be missed on the i360) so you’ve still got plenty of opportunities to catch them. If you love camp, comedy and a bit of innuendo, you’ll love this. C’est Magnifique!
By Kemi Ayoola
Fri 8th, Sat 9th, Thurs 14th (i360 show) and Fri 29th May; from £12
brightonfringe.org
