1970s downtown Philadelphia – and Dolores van Cartier (Landi Oshinowo) is brassy, sassy and hungry for fame as a performer. Her (married) gangster boyfriend Curtis promises he’ll give her that big break she’s waiting for. But in reality all he really gives her is his wife’s hand me down fur as a Christmas gift.
Finally cottoning on that he’s not the man she hoped he was, Dolores find herself in the wrong place (behind a garbage can) at the wrong time, when she sees Curtis pull a gun and shoot one of his hangers on dead.
Though Dolores promises she saw nothing, her days are numbered. Step in dependable cop steady Eddie Souther (Alfie Parker) who places her in protective custody in the least likely place you’d expect to find a sparkly sequinned kinky booted nightclub singer. A convent, of course.
There Dolores joins a motley crew of misfit nuns under the watchful and disapproving eye of mother superior (Lesley Joseph).
What follows is a riot of a feel good, fantastic and soul affirming show with singing that raises the spirits and sends feel-good shivers down the spine. Sets are bright, bold, glittering and colourful and you’ll be rapt as Dolores helps the caterwauling choir of nuns find their inner divas and helps save the convent from being bought out in the process.
With her strong soulful voice, Landi Oshinowo is sensational as Dolores. Her comic acting, too, hits all the right notes as she takes just the right amount of inspiration from Whoopi Goldberg’s original performance in the 1992 film.
Lesley Joseph as Mother Superior is her perfect foil. And what a star performer she is. Composed and understated she’s a far cry from the brash Dorien most of us know from her Birds of a Feather days. Just watch as she delivers her one-liners with a resigned aplomb.
Though the show is a comic masterpiece – you’ll smile and laugh until your cheeks ache – the singing takes centre stage. As well as Landi, all the sisters sing and act wonderfully – notable amongst them Lizzie Bea as Sister Mary Robert for her sweet soprano and the animated acting of Isabel Canning as Sister Mary Patrick.
Everyone was on their feet at the end of the show, whooping, clapping, singing along and generally not wanting the show to end.
Sister act. It’s a show sent from heaven . And, if Mother Superior will forgive my turn of phrase, one hell of an act to follow!
It’s on at Wales Millennium Centre until 18 November
For more dates visit sisteractthemusical.co.uk