From Here to Eternity review

It’s been nearly a decade since this musical, based on the bestseller by James Jones, premiered in the West End. There are plenty of reasons why it should have been a hit – not least the contribution from Tim Rice as lyricist. Yet it failed to excite either critics or audiences, and closed after six months. This new production from American director Brett Smock has been strategically reworked, with a pared-back design that ramps up the intensity.

Set in the weeks leading up to the attack by Japanese forces on Pearl Harbour in 1941, Jones’ book follows the lives of various soldiers in G Company. With too much time on their hands, rivalries develop, illicit affairs are ignited and Mrs Kipfer’s brothel does great business.

In Smock’s gritty traverse staging, everything seems amplified. The belting chorus of G Company bellow their boredom and frustration. Cressida Carré’s testosterone-fuelled choreography echoes regimental manoeuvres with platoon efficiency, and Stuart Brayson’s score comes into its own, thanks to new arrangements and orchestrations from musical director Nick J Barstow. The focus is sharper, the atmosphere more oppressive, and there are some exceptional performances. 

Chris Murray’s excellent sound design brings clarity to Brayson’s score and Rice’s evocative lyrics, while Smock’s direction ensures that the stories of Sergeant Warden and Privates Prewitt and Maggio all drive the narrative equally. Jonathan Bentley is a sensation as the stubborn Prewitt, a career soldier with principles who refuses to get back in the boxing ring for the company. He’s convincingly obsessed with Lorene, a sex worker played with understated strength by Desmonda Cathabel: their duet Love Me Forever Today both lightens the mood and underlines the inevitable fragility of their relationship. 

Adam Rhys-Charles is also persuasive as the conflicted Warden – torn between devotion to the army and an affair with his captain’s wife Karen. Carley Stenson breathes warmth into this unhappy role, wistfully asking if there is More to Life Than This as she pours yet another whisky. The outspoken Italian-American hustler Maggio could easily dominate this show, but here Jonny Amies is a skulking presence – the tragic focus of the story’s themes of bullying, racism and homophobia.

By taking the show back to the drawing board, the creative team has solved many of its problems. There’s barely a misstep in Smock’s formidable production: it has the energy of a prizefight, the pathos of doomed romance and the tension of a ticking bomb.