Evaluate: ‘The Nice British Bake Off Musical’ Is Candy however Underbaked

The primary query you’re prone to ask about “The Nice British Bake Off Musical” is, certainly, “Is it candy?” Such a tone, dusted with numerous sugar, has been essential to the success of the favored TV program this new stage present adapts, and which pits novice bakers in opposition to each other to see who can good the petit 4 or give you probably the most luscious Key lime pie.

And the present, which opened on Monday on the Noël Coward Theater for a restricted run via Could 13, actually is generous-spirited. Throughout its two-and-a-half hour working time, the musical’s likability isn’t in query, even when its craft generally is: You may’t assist wishing the creators had been as exacting with their very own materials as a few of the contestants are with their ovens.

Newcomers to this milieu ought to know that “The Nice British Bake Off” first aired in Britain in 2010 on the BBC, earlier than transferring to the industrial broadcaster Channel 4, and spawning numerous offshoots alongside the best way: “Junior Bake Off,” for one, to showcase these adolescents, and youthful, who’ve a penchant for pastry. (In the USA, the unique is named “The Nice British Baking Present.”)

This stage iteration, written by Pippa Cleary and Jake Brunger and directed by Rachel Kavanaugh, was first seen final summer time within the spa city of Cheltenham, within the west of England, and has been put collectively along with Love Productions, the corporate behind the TV present.

On residence turf, the TV collection has frequently made headlines, however you don’t must be accustomed to the so-called “Hollywood handshake” — the gesture of approval from Paul Hollywood, one of many judges — to know the terrain of the musical. Devotees of its small-screen authentic will be aware numerous in jokes, to not point out the visible match that has been achieved between Hollywood and Prue Leith — his bespectacled fellow choose — and the musical’s co-stars John Owen-Jones and Haydn Gwynne.

However maybe the largest attraction of the TV materials is the cross-section of British society the rivals signify. The musical, maybe inevitably but additionally slightly drippily, whisks dollops of uplift into the combination. You get a comic book quantity wherein the 2 judges seem as dueling scones alongside life classes elsewhere about “the recipe of me,” and it’s recommended that baking could make you are feeling higher about your self.

An introductory sequence broadcasts, with mock-biblical fervor, the delivery of flour and sugar. And earlier than we all know it, we’re within the present’s iconic white tent — Alice Energy designed not simply the units and costumes but additionally the muffins — and assembly the disparate group of eight bakers who can be whittled down to 1 winner. Their fates are accompanied by continuous innuendo about soggy bottoms, noticed dicks and some other culinary double entendres which may induce a snicker (let’s not neglect cream-filled buns).

The self-regarding Izzy (Grace Mouat) is so positive of her success that she will get a dance quantity, “Clearly,” in reward of her personal bravura. On the reverse finish of the spectrum is the nervous chatterbox Gemma (Charlotte Wakefield), a depressive well being aide from Blackpool whose climactic anthem, “Rise,” attracts instantly from the “Depraved” playbook of self-empowerment. In line with the “Depraved” theme, the older, notably fastidious Russell (Michael Cahill) speaks individually of individuals “coming into your life for a cause” — a well-recognized sentiment from the sooner present. The pie-themed musical “Waitress” hovers within the wings, as properly.

There’s one thing of a rummage-sale really feel to Cleary and Brunger’s eclectic rating, which attracts upon such various sources as Cole Porter (a jaunty duet for the judges) and Stephen Sondheim: The great Gwynne begins the second act with a sequined dance quantity that might have come from “Follies.” She additionally reprises the cartwheel that wowed audiences some years again in “Billy Elliot,” and when she speaks of dipping “your little finger in my raclette,” the picture sounds notably lewd.

Hassan (a profitable Aharon Rayner), an immigrant based mostly in Wembley, northwest London, hankers for the smells of Syria, his onetime residence, whereas Francesca (Cat Sandison), a instructor with infertility points, sings of how panforte and panettone are a part of her Italian heritage.

I want it weren’t fairly so preordained that the outspoken, thrice-married Babs (the redoubtable Claire Moore) would get a lusty showstopper wherein her libido is revealed in all its energy; the tune’s title, “Babs’ Lament,” nods instantly towards “Guys and Dolls,” a revival of which occurs to be previewing throughout city for the time being.

And as quickly as we now have glimpsed the widower Ben (Damian Humbley, in characteristically tremendous voice), it’s clear the competition will discover him a companion: he’s even obtained a precocious 9-year-old daughter, Lily, to induce him on his amorous path, although not earlier than she slightly implausibly rattles off an inventory of as we speak’s ills, the struggle in Ukraine amongst them.

This musical occupies a special, extra harmless world — one wherein strudels are restorative and, because the present places it, “cake is the treatment.” I’m as absolutely on board with that message as anybody. What’s wanted is extra artwork to accompany the center.

The Nice British Bake Off Musical

By way of Could 13 on the Noël Coward Theater in London; bakeoffthemusical.com