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Review: Tirlittan

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Tirlittan came to Kallio, Tirlittan conquered

Marika Westerling is the adorable orphan girl of the Helsinki City Theatre

Oiva Paloheimo: Tirlittan. The small stage of the Helsinki City Theatre. Arrangement and direction Leena Havukainen, music Toni
Edelmann, music arrangement and orchestra conductor Jussi Tuurna, lyrics by Vesa Reponen, set design and costumes by Metti Nordin,
choreography Sari Palmgren, lighting Risto Heikkerö, sound Kirsi Peteri, cast: Marika Westerling, Riitta Havukainen, Heikki
Sankari, Otto Kanerva, Kristiina Halttu, Antti Timonen, Matti Rasila and Ursula Salo. Orchestra Jussi Tuurna, Mari Kätkä, Markku
Luuppala, Lauri Salokoski and Mikael Seire.

A touch of the action heroine of Pippi Longstocking, another one of those Saint-Exupéry’s The Philosophy of The Little Prince and a lot of slick imagination, but also wise and critical common sense –
these ingredients create Tirlitta, Oiva Paloheimo’s masterful collection of stories and survival stories, fairy tales and poems.
   
The starting points are not alien to the Helsinki City Theatre’s musical play version, among other things, because
An excellent actress has been found for the demanding lead role of the orphan girl.
   
The young Marika Westerling became known already as the moving Cosette in the musical Les Misérables at the City Theatre. As Tirlittan, she is of course different
earth, but absolutely excellent and sweet. Westerling’s Tirlittan is a bright-eyed and bright-brained child beauty and
in addition, a wonderful singer to cope with Toni Edelmann’s multicoloured compositions. This Tirlittan must be loved.
   

Music is
Besides Westerling’s performance, almost the best thing about the new Tirlittan. Edelmann is once again a masterful theatre composer,
Swim like a fish in water in the worlds of rap, schlock, gospel and tango.
   

Vesa Reponen had time to write the lyrics to Tirlittan’s songs. They, too, with their cunning final chords, are complete theatrical stuff.
   

Jussi Tuurna , on the other hand, has arranged music into a cornucopia of notes, rhythms and tempos. When the band also consists of front-row musicians,
There should be no objections to the matter. If not a little about volume problems. At times, the orchestra covers the vocals.
   

Completely problem-free
Tirlittan, adapted and directed by Leena Havukainen , is not a children’s theatre anyway.
   
The sections after the intermission are joyful to see and hear. Riitta Havukainen turns the Bone Light Lady into an impossibly joyful character who, by the way, miraculously resembles a British comedy dressed as a woman
star, the essence of Dame Edna.
   
Havukainen is wildly funny and a suitable match for Westerling’s calmly shooting Tirlittan.
   
However, the beginning of the performance is badly awkward. The scenes are too short to live much other than extreme type comedy
. The ever-lovely crow hangs on the wires like some clumsy thing.
   

At first, it feels like
that we are just on our way to the next song. Drama is less important.
   
For this reason, the growth arc of the orphan girl remains more a matter of faith than the twists, cause and effect of the play
. Change, growing up, is stated at the end in Tirlittan’s own line. That’s pretty much it.
   

Metti Nordin’s fairytale costumes are colourful to see. With the support of Risto Heikkerö’s inventive lighting, the psychedelic set also serves as an arena for countless venues, albeit the glaring basic nature of the curly walls
is quite far from the much calmer images evoked by Paloheimo’s work.
   
The external takes up space from the internal.
   
The performance has been made more in the mold of today’s theatrical trends than in Oiva Paloheimo’s work, but luckily Tirlittan’s
Even the ocarina rings out from time to time, both literally and internally in the course of the orphan girl’s beloved story. City Theatre
After all, you leave Tirlittan in good spirits.