David Soul is far better in hell than a television studio. I mean to be complimentary in saying this, at least in a half-hearted way.
For Soul, who found fame with TV's Starsky And Hutch and a handful of hit singles, has reclaimed a place in the limelight by taking over the nonsinging title role in Jerry Springer - The Opera.
He is modestly competent, but unless or until he finds ways of perking up his performance, this amusingly vulgar, sacrilegious show, with its clever pastiche of serious opera, will sacrifice some of its edge and energy.
As Springer, the talk-show TV host whose intrusive questions to his trailer-trash guests inspires them to confess their sexual secrets and weird hang-ups, Soul strikes few sparks: the man who was a sexy, blond heartthrob in the Seventies now sports glasses and the air of a grizzled grandfather. He stands listlessly with his Springer prompt-cards, behaving like a stranger at his own party.
Only in the second half, when Soul has sunk from the Jerry Springer show to the world's deepest basement, otherwise known as Hell, where God and Jesus put in guest appearances, does he become animated and interesting.
His spurt of testy energy may, ironically, have something to do with the fact that Jerry appears to have been mortally wounded by a shot fired at some tap-dancing Ku Klux Klanners in the world above.
There is nothing, Soul's performance shows, like the threat of death to bring you back to life. Michael Brandon, who first played Springer, also stood around playing cool while his guests talked and sung about what made them hot.
Yet Brandon's Jerry, all smug and smooth, had what Soul has yet to divine - a touch of personality. Otherwise the production is still spryly performed and sung, though Hadrian Delacey makes a muted Devil compared with his predecessor, David Bedella.
Jerry Springer - The Opera
