A song that I thought was a fantastic start as the first song of the week. As it was the inspiration for the name of this website.
In quick summary to explain song of the week, it is going to be a song I feel I have enough to say about and analyse. So every couple of weeks I will write a small article having a closer look at the chosen song.
This week I have chosen Perfectly Marvellous from Cabaret. Even just looking at the name that emphasises the supposed happiness of the characters hope and their futures, but leaves you feeling slightly off as the name feels the need to define their happiness twice in one title. This is a theme throughout Cabaret, the trying to cover up the darkness with even more exaggerated positivity, that makes the audience slightly uncomfortable.
The first couple verses of the song we begin with the end of an awkward conversation between Sally and Cliff. Where Sally attempts to console Cliff that she doesn't believe in the need for differences between people to be oppressed. As she desperately tries to convince Cliff that he can trust her with "I think people are people, I really do, Cliff. Don't you?" She then tells Cliff about her difference to most, that she paints her "fingernails green" because she thinks it's pretty. Showing that just like Cliff, to create trust she is still only willing to expose the surface of her character. When it is clear to the audience that Sally has a lot more depth of character than just that.
It may start as a persuasion for her own gain but quickly progresses to the start between the romance between Sally and Cliff, as they bond over the destruction they collectively try to push away. At this point in the chorus of the song we see Sally effectively trying to bring her attitude to work from inside the Kit Kat Club to outside within her relationship with Cliff. When she describes herself as perfectly marvellous and most importantly Berlin of the time (1929-1930) as a perfectly wonderful place, despite Berlin very quickly becoming anything but wonderful.
Half way through the song Sally has Slyly invited herself to live with Cliff, despite a lack of a formal invite. Just to get her point across she shouts about how fantastic them living together would be. Cliff quickly catches on and tries to let her down slowly by telling her he is afraid it wouldn't work because she is "much to distracting." Sally responds with what Cliff really wants, inspiration. It is demonstrated particularly clearly in this song that the characters want nothing more than to push away the immanent gravity of the situation, as we see Cliff and Sally bond over both struggling in their work. Sally's best excuse is that she will serve as the inspiration that Cliff so desperately needs because he came to Berlin "to force creation."
They finally come to the conclusion that an agreement of Sally allowing him to work is better than the both of them having to struggle, like they are watching so many around them. All seems fine until Cliff if forced by his current circumstances to ask Sally if she has any money, to be shocked by just how little she actually has of just 6 marks but she tells him it will only be a few days. So he gives in and allows her to stay, purely because of the charming manor in which she asks and the friendship they have quickly formed over their hidden hardship.
Even when cliff has agreed he is afraid that he's "said a dumb thing" but still allows it to go on, if only out of hope for society to be better than the politics that go on off stage during Cabaret. The song ends with the line "we'll think of something" highlighting some of the cracks that are beginning to show and leak through into the perfect world they are so desperately trying to create.
That's the end of my analysis of Perfectly Marvellous make sure to stay tuned in for more songs of the week.
Nathan Ives-Moiba as Cliff in 2023 production of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club
Rebecca Lucy Tailor as Sally in 2023 production of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club
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