Rose Theatre, Kingston upon Thames – until 24 May 2025
Reviewed by Phil Brown
5*****
What sets the revelatory Marie and Rosetta apart from many excellent musicals that appear on London stages are the nature of the subject and the format.
It’s a joyous celebration of the seminal nature of Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s role in the development of popular music. And Rosetta Tharpe is unlikely to have much, if any name recognition outside of serious musicologists or the boomer generation who lived through the British blues explosion of the 60s. This applies even more in the case of the little known Marie Knight. Secondly, it’s a dialogue intense two handed play (writer – George Brant) with music, rather than being predominantly music with a few spoken word links.
In keeping with an inspirational story of black female musicianship, this follows through to the classy four piece backing band (although musical supervisor Liam Godwin was on piano for press night).
Sister Rosetta Tharpe (1915–1973) was a pioneering gospel singer and electric guitarist, and cared little for convention by moving between spiritual and secular (eg Cotton Club) settings. She is credited with influencing the likes of Presley, Cash and Little Richard. Her 1945 hit “Strange Things Happening Every Day” (performed in the show) is considered the first rock ‘n’ roll record. It seems grossly unjust that such a ground breaking star often referred to as the “Godmother of Rock and Roll” or the “original soul sister” is largely a forgotten figure today. This hit-in-waiting play should help rectify that.
Marie Knight (1920–2009) started as a gospel singer in a vocal group called The Sunset Four before rising in prominence after teaming up with Rosetta in the mid-1940s. Possessing a powerful contralto voice she caught Rosetta’s attention whilst performing on a Mahalia Jackson bill. Like a canny football manager, she moved quickly to recruit her before Jackson, another powerful gospel presence, could. Together, Rosetta and Marie performed gospel duets with strong blues and R&B influences, producing hits like Up Above My Head (also featured in the show).
The play opens in Mississippi 1946. Rosetta (played by Beverley Knight) and Marie (played by Ntombizodwa Ndlovu) are getting to know each other in one of the most unusual settings you are likely to see – a funeral parlour including a coffin, illuminated cross and shrouds which hide the band members (set designer – Lily Arnold). The funeral home is used for rehearsal and as a place to sleep after the show, black performers not being allowed into hotels in the American south.
In the course of 100 engrossing minutes (no interval) of wonderfully natural, often hilarious imagined conversation, punctuated by some of the most uplifting music there is, we get to know their respective back stories, philosophies and hang ups. Even though Rosetta is only a few years older than Marie, she has a depth of experience, self belief and focus to have a definite vision for their future.
After they each demonstrate their vocal prowess – Rosetta (Knight) with This Train and Marie (Ndlovu) with the gorgeously sung Were You There, they start to iron out how to perform together in amusing detail. Rosetta generously mentors Marie in her role as collaborator – from how to swing her hips to “you’re not my back up little sister, you’re my and” – as in Rosetta and Marie. “Keep that up for too long and it’ll be Marie and Rosetta”. This ends up in the first full blooded duet with Rosetta and Marie combining fabulously in audience favourite Didn’t It Rain. “Mahalia gonna be mad…”
As streetwise Rosetta surprisingly declares she can’t be doing with the commercial side of things and asks Marie to look after the money, the conversation takes another hilarious turn to useless and occasionally violent men – “squirrels” in Rosetta parlance, as in “squirrelling my money away for a rainy day”. “Preachers – they’s the worst squirrels there is…” This leads to a rocking duet I Want a Tall Skinny Papa.
This was followed by possibly the standout moment of the evening as Rosetta (Knight) sang I Looked Down the Line accompanied only by music director Shirley Tetteh’s funk guitar having stepped out of her booth into the spotlight with Rosetta.
Then in quick succession we have the fully functioning duo tearing it up with Up Above My Head, and Strange Things Are Happening Everyday.
At this point, events take a strange turn as we suddenly understand that Rosetta has died and Marie Knight has been mentally reminiscing about their time together and agonising over the lack of recognition, presumably on the occasion of Rosetta’s death in 1973. Arguably, the true progenitor of rock and roll ended up in an unmarked grave in Philadelphia, a headstone eventually being erected in 2009. The play concludes with Marie (Ndlovu)’s beautifully soulful Peace in the Valley.
Overall, the thrilling Marie and Rosetta is a triumph. It showcases sheer excellence from the whole production team. Brant’s dialogue is brilliantly written and superbly delivered, although with the actors speaking in authentic sounding but heavy southern US accents, it was tricky at first to pick up all of the speech. Direction by Monique Touko is first rate, whilst the singing and music accompaniment is non pareil. We’ve come to expect Beverley Knight MBE to perform at the highest level, but I have to especially commend Ntombizodwa Ndlovu on a truly sparkling performance.