Cast a jaundiced eye over the productions currently clogging up London's West End, and you'll reach the conclusion that all you need to barge your way into the tacky world of musicals is either a job lot of dead rock stars, like Four Steps to Heaven, or a heap of elderly pop songs from a previous era, in the style of Soul Train.
Oh! What A Night isn't the worst specimen you'll find. At least it has some semblance of a story, and the trio of scriptwriters have gestured vaguely in the direction of giving the characters some kind of individual identity. The year is 1976, the setting is the Inferno disco in New York, and a film company is planning to use the Inferno as a venue for auditioning dancers for a new movie about the disco boom, Saturday Night Fever in all but name.
Meanwhile, the Inferno's owner Paul Burns is drinking himself into financial and personal ruin, while conniving bad guys plot to steal the club from under his nose. One of them - who is not only an accountant but also the world's squarest man - is going to marry his darling daughter, Nikki. But not if new bartender Rik, who has arrived from Stockport to seek his fortune, can whisk Nikki away in a swirl of high kicks and polyester.
As a plot it has potential, but most of it gets lost in a smog of grindingly feeble jokes and insipid dialogue. Star billing goes to Kid Creole, who plays the Inferno's crassly-named DJ Brutus T. Firefly and brings a dash of authentic Americana to the proceedings, as well as some taste-challenging suits in yellow, pink and zebra-stripes.
The Kid makes you realise how much the rest of the cast is lacking in glitz and star quality. Lucy Moorby makes a reasonable effort as Nikki and Nigel Roche's mincing Stretch makes Dale Winton look like Clint Eastwood, but Will Mellor as Rik resembles Yorkshire fast bowler Darren Gough so closely that all his dance moves look as though he's begging the umpire for an LBW verdict, while Michael Howe's Paul remains resolutely colourless throughout.
Salvation, such as it is, arrives in the form of a barrage of disco classics, including everything from the Hustle, Car Wash and Play that Funky Music to YMCA and the Commodores' Easy.
The dancing is colourful and energetic, on an ingenious set which folds inside out to become either a Manhattan street scene or the Inferno's spacious interior. Thanks to the feisty house band, the long finale based on Kool And The Gang's Celebration (not actually released until 1980, trainspotters!) turned into an extended rave which was by far the best part of the show. If you're going, disengage your brain first.
