One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas I will never know. This 1954 awarding-winning Broadway musical by Richard Adler, Jerry Ross and George Abbott, based on Richard Bissell’s novel, Seven-and-¬a-half-cents, is a lot of fun. The workers in a pajama factory want a pay rise. The dishonest boss stalls for time. The workers threaten to go on strike. Industrial action might seem a more suitable subject for a musical by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill or Marc Blitzstein; but The Pajama Game doesn’t pretend to be agit-prop theatre. It’s written and performed in a much lighter and more frivolous comedy key.
The handsome works superintendent falls in love with the sexy head of Union’s Grievance Committee. The chemistry is good between Joanna Riding and Michael Xavier. You believe they want to get into each other’s pajamas. Xavier, with the aid of a Dictaphone, has a delightful duet with himself, “Hey There, You with the Stars in Your Eyes.” Peter Polycarpou and Claire Machin stop the show with “I’ll Never Be Jealous Again.” Alexis Owen-Hobbs, Dan Burton, Richard Jones stop it again with “Steam Heat.” Stephen Mear’s energetic choreography for “Once-A-Year-Day”, “Hernando’s Hideaway” and “Seven-and-a-Half-Cents” gives Richard Eyre’s thoroughly enjoyable production a big lift every time.