Dick Lee's Hotpants: Good revival for the 2014 audience

A restaging of Dick Lee's musical first performed in 1997, the 1970s-themed Hotpants was about 3 schoolgirls forming a group to compete in their school's talentime.  Through this event, they went through their own self discovery - boy-girl relationship, hopes and betrayal.   At the same time, their mothers, who were reunited through the girls' activities and were once schoolmates, were having their own bit of fun....

Hotpants did not seem dated and related well to the current audience.  I did not know if Dick Lee made any changes to the original script; for this production the plot was relatively tight and straightforward.  There were witty lines and catchy songs, in the same mould as Beauty World, another musical of Dick Lee.    While the main focus was on the 3 girls, it was the part on the mothers which was more interesting.   There were some plot twists in the second half but unfortunately it was not fully developed.


The cast of 10 gave a good performance and could hold a tune. Nikki Muller in particular gave a memorable performance as one of the mothers Suzy, who worked as a secretary in school but still longed for the wild life.  Her scenes with Vice Principal Pereira (played by Ebi Shankara) were amusing and both actors had great chemistry between them.  Denise Tan performed well in the role of capricious mother Connie, who after meeting Suzy, longed for some excitement in her life with some disastrous results.

I am always wary about restaging of older musicals.  But Hotpants delivered and I had an enjoyable evening at the Drama Centre.