Dazzling Dexter

Too many musicals in London? It depends whether you think the West End should be a temple or a funfair. Room for both, I’d say. But the fact that many musicals are thriving doesn’t mean any musical will. Hit shows succeed because they get virtually everything right. Bad Girls gets three out of five things right. The stylised sets are magnificently gruesome, the acting is terrific and the lyrics are pert and witty. But the tunes are forgettable and the plot is mishandled. The writers style themselves ‘story drivers’ so they should decide which car they’re in. They’ve got half a dozen excellent storylines here and they want to keep them all. Mistake. What’s needed is a single central arc for us to latch on to — a core. All they offer is ‘crimz wiv artsa gold’, and that’s not enough. The script jumps up and down like the FTSE and you never know where it’ll land next. We open with weepy newcomer Rachel being groomed for sex by nasty male screw Fenner. Then we shift to Nikki, a lesbian murderess appealing against her life sentence for killing a copper who raped her girlfriend (see what I mean by good plotlines). Then Sally Dexter arrives — dazzling Sally Dexter — and blows everyone else off stage with her triumphantly sexy turn as a gangster’s mistress whose trousers are so tight she must have been born in them. Then she’s sidelined and a riot starts and the right-on prison governor is struggling to hang on to her job while being courted by …well, on it goes. The best moment is ‘Banged up without the bang’, a strangely moving number about stifled lust in which clever lyrics, raunchy melodies and heartfelt, teasing choreography coalesce in a perfect piece of entertainment. And watch out for Moira Charles playing a tiny little old lady who swears a lot.