Review: 101 Dalmatians at Liverpool Empire ****

Dodie Smith loved Dalmatians. Reports vary, but it’s thought while the author didn’t quite get to 101, she certainly had at least nine at one time and possibly as many as 17.

My brother has one absolutely lovely but very lively ‘spotty dog’, and frankly wrangling a whole pack of them isn’t for the faint-hearted. Particularly as faint-hearted as the ineffectual duo who are the supposedly responsible adults looking after Pongo, Perdi and their huge litter of pups in this endearing stage musical version of Smith’s story.

Funnily enough, Smith started her writing career as a playwright (her intergenerational family drama Dear Octopus has been revived recently at the National Theatre) but never turned her most famous creations into a live show herself.

This musical is two steps removed from the source novel, having been created from a stage adaptation by writer and director Zinnie Harris.

The book here comes from Johnny McKnight and has a merry whiff of panto about it, particularly in the ‘evil’ triumvirate of Cruella (Kym Marsh) and her hapless henchmen Casper (Charles Brunton) and Jasper (Danny Hendrix).

Meanwhile the jolly, endlessly melodic and at times hypnotic score – performed with gusto by an ensemble whose triple threat credentials cover acting, singing and puppeteering and supported by robust accompaniment from a live band – comes from Olivier and Tony Award winning actor Douglas Hodge.

Above: Tom (Samuel Thomas) and Perdi (Emma Thornett) meet Danielle (Jessie Elland) and Pongo (Linford Johnson). Top: Pongo, Perdi and three of their progeny with their cat rescuer.

The tale opens with poor Pongo (Linford Johnson) abandoned by his humans in a callous midnight dumping (don’t get me started on the responsibilities of owning pets) and ending up in a rehoming centre, Puppy Love, whose inhabitants sing a poignant ‘Take Me Home’.

Pongo (Smith named him after her first Dalmatian) is taken home by Puppy Love helper Danielle (Jessie Elland), and it’s during a subsequent walk in the park that there’s a sort of double ‘meet cute’ between them and dithering fashion designer Tom (Samuel Thomas) and his own Dalmatian, the calm and sensible Perdi (Emma Thornett).

It’s the exasperated spotty dogs that get their ‘pet’ humans together, and soon the quartet are playing happily families with the patter of many, many tiny feet canine on the horizon – albeit one over which looms the figure of psychopathic fashionista Cruella De Vil.

Above: Kym Marsh as Cruella de Vil with Jasper (Danny Hendrix) and Casper (Charles Brunton).

Marsh is fabulous as the skin-wearing femme fatale, slinking around the stage in giraffe pelt couture and full boo-able baddie mode, distributing withering put downs and telling drippy Danielle to “use your big girl voice dear”. The children in the audience don’t like her, but obsessive animal skinning habits aside, her Cruella is monstrously magnificent.

On the side of good, the stars of the show are undoubtedly the animal puppets.

While Bill Buckhurst directs the show with warmth and humour, puppet designer Jimmy Grimes – aided by Aled Williams on ‘puppet tech’ – is responsible for bringing not just the Dalmatians but also an assortment of other canines, and several cats, to life.

In essence, 101 Dalmatians the Musical is colourful, knockabout fun with a poignant heart to it.

It’s aimed at a family audience (it’s a brave parent who can stand firm against the spotty siren call of the merchandise stall) which is why the evening shows begin at 7pm.

This is important to note because on opening night, the opening 30 minutes of the first half were disrupted by an almost constant procession of latecomers caught out by this seemingly discombobulating fact.