At least she didn’t fake it…..

Forty-one years on from her first (and sadly last) West End theatrical stage appearance in Funny Girl, Barbra Streisand has been back in London in concert, helping to inaugurate the 02 Arena as a venue that finally makes sense of the white elephant of the Dome and has turned it into a handsome addition to London’s large-scale entertainment portfolio.

I went last night, and though the venue is undeniably large and the demand for the restaurants currently far outstrips the supply so I was forced to visit the Ben and Jerry’s ice-cream stand at the Vue cinema upstairs for a pre-show snack, the seats are actually comfortable, the staff universally friendly and polite, and the tube station is right next door – compare and contrast with the refurbished but still ghastly Wembley Arena.

That, of course, was the scene of Streisand’s last come-back concert 13 years ago, so she’s gone up in the world and so, too, have her prices: from a ridiculous £360 top then, to an absurd £500 now – a price that got a couple of friends I know last night seats in the 40th row of the flat arena area. And while I still feel uncomfortable about an egotism — whether her own or that of her management, but in either case she is complicit in — that, instead of rewarding the fans for their loyalty (as witness Prince’s example here, where all seats for his 21-night run at the Arena will be just £31.21) seems intent on fleecing them instead, nobody is, I suppose, forcing us to pay up. There is, of course, an inverse logic that enhances the value of something that costs more, and feeling that’s it’s exclusivity increases the experience or leaves you feeling ripped off is surely purely in the eye – and wallet – of the receiver.

As it is, I thought that my own £100 (plus £12.50 service charge) was well spent, in the end, for a seat behind the stage. Sure, I often only got a side or rear view, but then how different is that to seeing Betrayal at the Donmar Warehouse? In a programme that highlighted her theatrical roots – beginning with the Funny Girl overture performed by the lavish 58-piece orchestra and leading into her first song, ‘Starting Here, Starting Now’ by Maltby and Shire (who, coincidentally, have a new show premiering in London this very week, when Take Flight opens at the Menier Chocolate Factory on Wednesday) – we had songs from Lloyd Webber, Bernstein and Sondheim, Rodgers and Hammerstein, and Maury Yeston, amongst others.

And to emphasise the Broadway connection, she was joined by four Broadway actors: Hugh Panaro (last seen in the title role of the short-lived Lestat, and before that doing a two-year stint in the title role of The Phantom of the Opera), Michael Arden (late of the short-lived Twyla Tharp Dylan musical The Times They Are A-Changing), Peter Lockyer (last of the comparatively short-lived Broadway version of La Boheme by Baz Luhrmann) and Sean McDermott (last seen on Broadway as a take-over Danny Zucko in Broadway’s last revival of Grease that ended in 1998, a role to be played in Broadway’s next Grease, of course, by a performer chosen by reality TV). Those names, of course, would have meant nothing to the bulk of last night’s London audience, but it also does highlight a problem – and proves why Streisand herself was so wise to cultivate her career away from Broadway: there simply isn’t much of a career to be had there any longer. After principal roles for all of these actors there, here they are now, doing back-up work.

And it was a fact also brought home to me by a conversation I had with the person sitting next to me, who had seen Streisand’s last London appearance 13 years ago – and was worried that if he didn’t see this show, might discover that in 13 years time from now it would be too late. By then, Streisand would be 79 – so I said “not necessarily – Barbara Cook, after all, turns 80 this October and is still going strong”. And he replied, “Who’s Barbara Cook? I’ve never heard of her!” It’s his loss. Cook’s career, begun like Streisand’s on the Broadway stage, has been continued on the concert and cabaret one, but wider celebrity has eluded her.

Yet Cook, who lives inside and through her material and has grown with it to a peak of artistic expression and perfection, is the greatest contemporary singer alive (in my humble opinion). And though Cook may, famously, go up on her lyrics from time to time when she performs live (as she does all the time, not every 13 years), that only amplifies her humanity. Streisand, as I was able to see for myself from the rear view I was getting, has every line and lyric autocued. Bizarrely, it was only when Streisand went off script last night for an anecdote about someone (whose name she then couldn’t recall) who played New York’s Bon Soir nightclub with her early on in her career that she felt not just unguarded but also vulnerable. While Cook, at 79, sounds as good as she ever did because she is all about interpretive truth, Streisand by comparison negotiates gingerly around some of the frayed edges of her voice to try to continue reclaiming the technical perfection that has always been one of her calling cards.

Still, at least (to borrow a lyric from Funny Girl’s ‘Don’t Rain on My Parade’) she doesn’t fake it – Liza Minnelli (and Connie Fisher, for that matter) have been known to mime to recorded music. Performing ballads like the Legrand classic (to lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman) ‘What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?’ or ‘You Don’t Bring Me Flowers’ (Neil Diamond, to lyrics by the Bergmans again) brings out her expressive, lyrical strengths. She may be less secure on the belt now, but she’s still a bracing performer.