“It would be a crime to miss it,” they’re saying of the new production of Chicago heading to Canberra Theatre in September. 

If you were to take the story seriously, and strangely enough it’s based on real Chicago history from the 1920s, the question of law and order is central to the plot, presided over by celebrity lawyer Billy Flynn.

The role has been on veteran actor Anthony Warlow’s bucket-list for years. He saw James Naughton in an early production on Broadway and Terry Donovan playing the charmingly corrupt advocate at the Theatre Royal during the ’80s, but he’s never had a chance to play it, until now.

Not that Warlow has been short of roles. His name is synonymous with musical theatre in Australia and he has trodden the world’s stages.

He’s played Daddy Warbucks in Annie and Captain Hook in Finding Neverland on Broadway. He’s been a star on the West End, sung in concerts at Carnegie Hall and he’s even been honoured as a NSW National Living Treasure by the National Trust of Australia. 

Roles with Opera Australia have been in Die Fledermaus, The Magic Flute, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Tales of Hoffmann and as the Pirate King in its production of The Pirates of Penzance, directed by Stuart Maunder. 

In short, his presence in the cast of Chicago adds an extra layer of showbiz razzle dazzle to the show.

However, like all good performers Warlow is not resting on his laurels and declares himself excited to join a younger generation of stars such as Zoe Ventura as Velma Kelly and Lucy Maunder as Roxie Hart, the two sisters in crime.

“I love going to work every day, it’s a real tonic to me” he tells me.

Chicago may have been performed again and again, but that doesn’t give it any less impact, Warlow believes.

“It still has gravitas in my view, even with people under the age of 40, who may not have heard of it before,” he says.

“For the older patrons, it’ll be just as great as ever.” 

For all the generations, he believes, there’s a vicarious thrill at seeing women in the cell block waiting to get out which “gives the show a peculiar kind of twist”.

The show is not a vocal challenge to a highly trained singer such as Warlow, as Billy Flynn doesn’t have much singing, but he praises it as “a tight production”.

“At the end of the day, we are all performing in the cabaret and vaudeville idiom, which is so universal,” he says.

“It’s also a good-looking show – I’m in a tuxedo, everyone’s in shades of black with some coloured highlights and it looks like a gala performance.”

The choreography in Chicago is almost as famous as the show about the merry murderesses.

An interesting side note to him is that when Bob Fosse, the original choreographer, got together with co-creators Fred Ebb and John Kander, they got stuck, so they put themselves into a hotel room and didn’t leave until they had written pretty much what we have today.

The choreography in this version of the show is by Ann Reinking and it’s a homage to Fosse but not a copy, although Warlow sees Roxie and Velma’s end number, Nowadays, as just like the original.

As for his own dancing, he just tries to move around holding other people, although he admits to having made up a couple of soft-shoe routines by himself.

Considering the showbiz fame of the show, it amuses Warlow that his part is the amalgamation of two real-life Chicago lawyers, William Scott Stewart and WW O’Brien, and that also the celebrity journalist Mary Sunshine is based on Maurine Dallas Watkins, who covered the real-life trial and wrote a play based on it.

Chicago, Canberra Theatre, September 7-29.