Life is a Cabaret features skilled storyteller and vocalist Sally McGreevy weaving together songs and anecdotes about Liza Minnelli’s life. This is McGreevy’s tenth year at the festival and it shows. A seasoned performer, she opens her act with the title track and immediately her audience warms to her. She then reveals snippets of Minnelli’s early life and captures the erratic nature of her formative years with the revelation that the star had attended twenty-two different schools by her sixteenth birthday.
At this young age Minnelli left home to pursue her dreams of being a dancer but with such a strong vocal heritage she was always destined to be a singer and just two years late, in 1964, performed ‘Gypsy in my Soul’ live at the London Palladium. McGreevy performs the track effortlessly before treating us to ‘Liza with a Z’ an hilarious track written for Minnelli whose first name was constantly misspelled and mispronounced.
Minnelli has led such an exceptional life that there is a vast quantity of material to choose from and McGreevy seems to have picked the perfect blend of major events – leading roles, Oscar wins, with lesser-known information such as an alleged fling with Australian PM John Gorton and her marriage to Jack Haley Jr., the son of actor Jack Haley, who played the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz – Dorothy’s daughter marrying Tin Man’s son! Equally as carefully considered are McGreevy’s tunes, which are delivered with the help of her three-man band. Alternating between showstoppers and softer melodies, she expertly captures the depth and vocal range of Minnelli.
I admit to not knowing much about Minnelli prior to this gig and to leaving it a little bit in awe of her. Despite being born into Hollywood royalty, she has had a challenging life, illustrated by McGreevy when she read a summary of her medical records which outlined Minnelli’s many physical scars and also her fierce resilience, using one period of convalescence to record a new album.
The show is brought to a close with a rendition of ‘New York, New York’ which McGreevy explains was Minnelli’s song before it was ever Sinatra’s. It feels like the perfect story and the perfect song to finish what is a loving tribute to a Broadway legend.
Life is a Cabaret is finished its festival run.
Reviewer: Triona Scully
Reviewed: 16th August 2025
North West End UK Rating:
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