The Baker’s Wife
05 September 2024
Menier Chocolate Factory
2.0 out of 5.0 stars
The Baker’s Wife, currently running at the Menier Chocolate Factory, hasn’t had the best reviews for its revival run. Is the criticism justified? Has this musical aged very badly? Well, I’d say yes, all of the above, but let’s start with a plot summary.
The tiny, remote French village of Concorde has just lost its resident baker and is waiting for his replacement to arrive, eager for a little change in their samey everyday lives. But when the man brings along his much younger, gorgeous wife, the talk of the town quickly shifts. One young man especially has taken a shine to the young Genevieve, wooing her passionately and urging her to run away with him. Having to decide between dependable, solid, tame love and the fiery passion of a new obsession, Genevieve is torn between the two men, plunging the entire village into chaos.
That’s a very reductive summary, but there honestly isn’t much more happening in this musical. While the staging is absolutely gorgeous, the substance just isn’t there. Visually, the Menier has once again pulled out all the stops, creating a small village square in their auditorium, with a small cafe on one side and the bakery on the other, tables and benches between the two. Before the show starts, actors wander around, sit at tables, chat with the audience, and invite patrons to join for a quick game of Boules while an accordion and a guitar set the ambience. But even this beautiful set cannot save the problematic script, so let’s get to that.
The plot is slow, extremely slow, lingering on how charming but boring village life can be. The characters feel more like caricatures from the 50s than real people, flinging misogynistic stereotypes around like they’re going out of style. This show is firmly settled into the Boomer style humour of men hating their wives, and the few men who do not talk in antiquated sexist pastiches, instead see women purely as commodities for their own amusement. Every single moment of humour is always at someone else’s expense. Actions are overdrawn and dramatic, and feel clumsy.
Now, the music is perfectly fine, nothing to write home about, but charming and upbeat, a bit light-hearted and silly at times. The lyrics often feel clunky, forced to rhyme when they really don’t, falling out of the actors’ mouths rather lumpily. The soundtrack feels hollow and stuffed with cliches rather than heart and soul.
This isn’t to say that the acting or singing are bad, the cast are giving it their all and there’s some brilliant vocal talent on display, but when the story is so cringey, outdated, overly dramatic, and stuffed to the brim with sexism, it’s difficult to focus on the talent at all.
To be fair, Genevieve’s “Meadowlark” and “Where’s the warmth?” are very touching songs, beautifully sung by Lucie Jones, but those were the only two stand-out moments in a very antiquated show. If someone where to take those two songs and create a modernised narrative minus all the misogyny and traditional themes, there could be a fantastic new musical constructed around these two songs alone. Other than that, I’d say skip this one, unless men joking about how they are trapped by their horrible wives in horrible marriages while clearly being abusive to these very same women is your kind of humour. Then by all means, this is the show for you.
