JADAR

★★★★☆

These past couple of weeks, Alan Cumming has been on everything, everywhere, all at once. One is reminded of that Doctor Who episode where no matter what channel you flick to, the “ghosts” are there. The best marketing strategy since Barbie, Alan’s countless TV and editorial appearances served to promote his long-awaited UK tour, Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age.

Alan is one of, not only Scotland’s but the world’s, most celebrated stars of the screen and stage, with numerous accolades under his belt, especially for playing The Emcee in Cabaret and Eli Gold in The Good Wife. Alan really has done it all, and whilst he is slowly approaching retirement age, he shows no signs of slowing down. He is not acting his age!

An evening of songs and stories, the main theme of the tour is, of course, age/ageing, but it is very much a reflection of Alan’s life so far.

Part concert, part talk, part stand-up, the show is as funny as it is poignant. Whilst musical theatre concerts can often feel quite grandiose and prestige, Alan is not about that – he’s Scottish! It often felt like we were just having a chat with him, and then he’d suddenly burst into song.

It is quite poetic that this tour visited Manchester because this is the city where he began his acting career – and look at him now!

Following his opening number – which was, sadly, not ‘Willkommen’ from Cabaret – he said, “I’m Alan Cumming but you knew that ’cause my name is on the ticket.” But whilst it’s his show, Alan made sure to credit his wonderful backing band, and he did so right after introducing himself. We love a man of humility.

He then took us through the concept of the tour and even offered a beautiful metaphor for the cyclical nature of life – no, not “life is a cabaret” but, rather, “[Life is] the same show with different costumes”.

His next number was Leiber and Stoller’s ‘Is That All There Is?”, which was made famous by Peggy Lee. The song is made up of spoken word passages which blur into the chorus, e.g. “I said to myself, ‘Is that all there is?’” Alan rewrote the verses, telling us stories about his own life.

He told us a story about ‘Part of Your World’ from The Little Mermaid, which he often sings at his New York club, Club Cumming – and followed it with a cover of Adele’s ‘When We Were Young,’ which reduced him to tears. He got all the tears out ahead of his next story, which was about death! He told us about the deaths of three beings he adored: his dog, Florence Henderson, and his fellow countryman, Sean Connery.

Fiercely political, Alan unashamedly revealed that he, like Connery, is a staunch support of Scottish Independence, which received a few cheers and claps, but much of the older English audience probably took a little offence (so sad, too bad).

However, more did applaud when he said that he believes in self-determination, including a woman’s right to choose, which is being taken away in the USA. Indeed, the idea that abortion could be illegalised is unfathomable here in the UK, but some American women face imprisonment even if they choose to abort their pregnancies to save their own lives.

He ended the first act with a Disney medley, made up of ‘Once On This Island’ from Moana and the aforementioned ‘Part of Your World’ from The Little Mermaid, ending it with the closing line of ‘Let It Go’ from Frozen: “The cold never bothered me anyway”. The Disney medley was a reflection of growing up in Scotland.

Alan finally acknowledged his award-winning performance in Cabaret at the top of the second act, where he sang Sally Bowles’ first solo number, ‘Mein Herr’.

Discussions of ageing continued – even scrotal ageing, which was fun – before Alan acknowledged The Good Wife. He treated us to a story about Broadway babe Kristin Chenoweth, who he worked with on The Good Wife and, more recently, the musical series Schmigadoon! – which, he revealed, had been cancelled earlier that day. He shaded Glenn Close, told us about his incredible sex life, and closed the main set with a medley made up of ‘How Did We Come to This?’ from The Wild Party and another Cabaret number: ‘Maybe This Time’.

Whilst the musical’s title song offers quite a pessimistic view of life (albeit cloaked in positivity), ‘Maybe This Time’ captures Alan’s eventful romantic and sexual history which came to an end when he finally met the one.

Whilst there was an encore, it was not dramatic: Alan briefly left the stage but the band did not. Alan had created a warm, relaxing atmosphere, and he did not want to cut through that.

Following his first number, Alan told us a sweet story about his supportive grandmother, which was a lovely, poetic way to end a show about getting older.

He closed the show with another medley, most prominently featuring Liza Minnelli’s feel-good ‘It Was a Good Time’ – a much more positive way to look back at your life.

Other musical theatre concerts have had more dramatic flare and much more glamorous sets (though this concert’s lighting, though minimal, was fantastic). However, this concert captured its concept completely. Alan pulled back the curtain and threw it on the floor. This was an anti-performance performance.

He came. He sang. He conquered.

Alan Cumming tours the UK until January 20, finishing off at SEC Armadillo in Glasgow, Scotland, before taking it to the US, where he now resides.

Photo: Danny Kaan