Review: Shrek
Shrek the musical convinces: You’re worthy of love, even if you’re a fart-emitting, green giant
The story of the green giant, Shrek, is familiar to many from the popular animated film. This autumn, Shrek has stomped on the stage of the Helsinki City Theatre in the giant musical Shrek. The performance is a Finnish version of the musical, which premiered at the end of 2008 on the famous Broadway. I confess that I was expecting something designed above all for children. But nope: this musical is perfect for adults! The age recommendation is school-age children and older.
The story is quite simple: Shrek is living alone in a swamp when a group of fairy tale characters suddenly appear there. They have been banished by Lord Farquaad, and to remedy the situation, Shrek must go to him. However, life changes unexpectedly when Shrek falls in love with the beautiful Fiona. Like a good fairy tale, this story also includes a dragon, among other things.
It is natural to start the assessment with the actors: they are excellent. Petrus Kähkönen’s stage charisma and magnificent voice become clear as soon as Shrek enters the stage. Laura Alajääski is a personal, luminous and characterful princess Fiona. And the song, wow! I would like to see many more of Matti Leino’s hilarious donkey. In the role of Villain Farquaad, we saw the natural Kari Arffman, who is also responsible for directing and translating into Finnish. I can’t help but wonder how Arffman’s body can handle constant walking on its knees.
The set and costumes are quite successful and the dance scenes are well rehearsed. Shrek is a feel-good musical with an important message. Although the atmosphere is light, there are many levels in the work that speak to different people in different ways. The verbiage was constantly hovering on the line of whether it was suitable for children’s ears or not. Some of the jokes were admittedly a bit worn-out, but on the other hand, in this context, like the trip of the green giant and the funny donkey, they also managed to make me laugh.
The music is not particularly memorable, but nice to listen to nonetheless. I especially fell in love with how well the performers sang. Wow. The fluent Finnish translations contain funny references to Finnish people and things.
Shrek’s message, on the other hand, is particularly topical and important. The play is about how everyone should accept themselves and others as they are. Everyone is worthy of love, even if they are a green giant who emits exceptionally foul-smelling farts. However, a bit in contradiction with this profound message is, for example, the mockery of the show’s villain character for his height and other ways of tearing humor out of stereotypical features. Hmm. Luckily the end result is clear.
Helsinki City Theatre’s musical Shrek brings much-needed cheer to the autumn. The first half flies by unnoticed and the second half is a pleasure to watch. During and at the end of the performance, you feel happy and self-criticism is gone.