Book, Lyrics and Director: Mark Janicello
Composer: Ulf Weidmann
From stardom to being wrongly imprisoned, The Finellis Musical in the West End’s Wonderville venue provides a singing-dancing fictionalised life story of showbiz star singer Tony Fenelli, that fundamentally disappoints.
The premise is simple, and yet the production stretches this basic storyline out for over two unsuccessful hours. Tony Finelli (Mark Janicello) has got out of prison after 15 years inside for a crime he didn’t do. The ex-showbiz star, along with his manager Juergen Drahtseil (Mark Sterling), returns to his New York life to find his wife Tina (Lisa Gorgin) and daughters (Anna Maria and Pippa Juliet) estranged, his mansion turned into a B&B and the music industry not what it used to be. Still plagued by the plans of malicious Mafia bosses, Tony must find a way to rekindle his familial relationships and revive his career after over a decade in the shadows.
Explanation and exposition are provided by background projections that feel like stock footage are unnecessary to the plot and confusing. AI-generated living rooms and hallways provide settings and transitions that often distract from the action on stage. The projections don’t just set the scene but get involved in the production. At the climax of the show, for example, the emotional song (sung beautifully by Janicello) is accompanied inexplicably by clips of soaring eagles and sunsets. Tornados and fire accompany angry moments; it reads more like a corporate video than a play and suggests the audience can’t work it out for themselves.
The main highlight of The Finellis Musical is solid vocal performances from all the cast, particularly Mark Sterling as Tony’s shady manager Juergen Drahtseil who serves an impressive voice throughout. But a flailing plot, simple melodies and juvenile lyrics make the songs themselves at best mundane and at worst cringe-worthy.
Equally daughters Lena (Pippa Juliet) and Lola (Anna Maria) give good vocal performances and the most energetic choreography of the cast, but are saddled with basic dialogue that comes off as childish even though they’re meant to be adults.
Markie Thompson gives a wonderful performance as Eva Klein, effervescent nightclub owner, with an exciting rendition of The Woman in the Mirror, a moving LGBTQ+ anthem. The short song is powerful, but amongst the numerous repetitive songs about very basic plot points, Thompson’s character and the entire short drag interlude feel entirely unnecessary and veer dangerously into tokenism.
The overall feel is unpolished, under-rehearsed even. Many of the jokes don’t land and all the cast oscillates between inconsistent accents and generic mafia sayings; there are only so many repetitions of ‘forget about it’ before all dialogue is rendered meaningless. It leaves a profoundly awkward feeling amongst the audience for the entirety of the production.
The length of the production is particularly felt; many of the songs drag, labouring the same point repeatedly. Tony and Tina Finelli, for example, are a couple who predominantly converse in generic biting jokes and cliché takedowns. This dialogue gets tired quickly, and the multiple songs doing the same thing is at times exhausting to watch, even if the performances are good. The couple’s happy ending provides a nice reunion song, but the audience has already tuned out. This trend is repeated for the rest of the characters.
Mark Janicello as writer, director and star makes The Finellis Musical unavoidably seem like a flailing personal project that fails to do almost anything successfully, except bring together people who are good at singing.
Runs until 16 June 2024
The Reviews Hub Score
Fundamentally disappoints
