musicals
Marianka Swain
Back by feverishly popular demand, Jim Steinman’s mega-musical is no longer in danger of alarming unsuspecting opera-goers. A year on from its Coliseum debut, this indisputably bonkers show moves to the West End venue it was surely always destined for – that lingeringly inhabited by its rock operatic forebear. The Queen is dead; long live the Loaf.Unlike most jukebox musicals, this one originated as a theatrical concept back in the Seventies, then became an unlikely hit album instead. Unfortunately, that hasn’t blessed it with, say, a decent script, coherent plotting or satisfying Read more ...
Marianka Swain
It is, perhaps, a tale that suffers from overfamiliarity. Tina Turner’s rags-to-riches story – from humble beginnings as little Anna Mae Bullock in Nutbush, Tennessee, to her discovery, reinvention and sickening abuse by husband and manager Ike Turner, and finally her rebirth as a solo rock'n'roll star – is the stuff of showbiz legend. This new glossy but pedestrian West End musical adds little to the established narrative.The structure doesn’t help. Starting at the very beginning and racing through the years, there’s only time for broad-brushstrokes storytelling and one-note supporting Read more ...
Laura de Lisle
Chicago has been on, in one form or another, for a very long time. The original Broadway production in the Seventies ran for 936 performances; the 1997 London revival was the longest-running American musical in West End history; and it feels like Cuba Gooding Jr’s face has been grinning out from escalator video screens on the tube for an age. This revival at the Phoenix Theatre is uneven, but eventually finds its groove and packs a real punch of a finale.The story, as usual with this kind of musical, is somewhat thin: wannabe vaudeville star Roxie Hart (Sarah Soetart) shoots her lover dead Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
If the Small Faces weren’t quite The Beatles or the Stones, they were one of the classic British bands of their era, and their recordings are treasured by ancient Mods, Damon Albarn, Noel Gallagher and even discerning representatives of today’s youth. Carol Harrison’s stage musical, evidently a labour of love by a devoted fan who knew singer Steve Marriott back in the day, successfully evokes the thrills and chaos of the mid-Sixties music business, and (better still) features an onstage band which manages to do the music justice.The quartet’s career only lasted from 1965 to 1969, which means Read more ...
Marianka Swain
The rolling stone is now at home in the West End, as Conor McPherson’s inimitable dramatic take on Bob Dylan transfers from the Old Vic, where it premiered last summer. Described as “a play with songs”, it’s the distinct harmony of two art forms, rather than straining one to incorporate the other in the usual jukebox musical fashion – and the resulting soulful tapestry allows form to articulately reflect its iconic inspiration.Set in Dylan’s hometown of Duluth, Minnesota, in the Depression-era 1930s, writer/director McPherson gathers a desolate gaggle of folks in a rundown guesthouse: owner Read more ...
Sam Marlowe
“Are you aware that we’re making history?” demands Alexander Hamilton in the show that has finally made the lesser-known Founding Father an international household name. And whether its creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, knew it when he wrote that line or not, making history is, indeed, what Hamilton is doing. The acclaim has been pretty much universal, the hype inescapable: 11 Tonys, a Grammy and a Pulitzer; celebrity fandom, and tickets as white-hot as they are hard to get your hands on. Now Thomas Kail’s production opens in London, and we are so ready: we’ve read numerous interviews and earnest Read more ...
Matt Wolf
These are challenging times for new British musicals. Following quickly on from a Pinocchio that ought to be way more joyful than it is, along comes The Grinning Man, a Victor Hugo-inspired musical first seen in autumn 2016 in Bristol. Sharing with its immediate predecessor a thematic interest in the transformative value of pain, Tom Morris's production is a visual delight that needs considerable streamlining and strengthening of tone if it is to amount to more than the musical theatre catch-all that it would seem to be at present.Its literary antecedent (Hugo's 1869 novel L'Homme qui rit) Read more ...
David Benedict
From Nicholas Hytner and Alan Bennett’s wonderfully nostalgic version of The Wind in the Willows through Coram Boy, the international smash hit War Horse and beyond, the National Theatre has a startling track record in turning what used to be patronisingly regarded as “family shows” into first-rate theatre. But for most of the first act of Pinocchio, the latest entry in the National’s Christmas Hits stakes, it looks as if there’s nothing worse than great expectations. Despite entrancing visuals, the uninvolving storytelling is as wooden as its central character. Mercifully, however, once Read more ...
Veronica Lee
You have to hand it to Menier Chocolate Factory, a venue that doesn't let size matter as it stages an all-singing, all-dancing new production of Barnum, a musical about Phineas Taylor (PT) Barnum – the 19th-century showman famed for staging “The Greatest Show on Earth”. Director Gordon Greenberg stages a big, blowsy spectacle in this small theatre, in the round, and its cast of 18 pack a real punch.Barnum (music by Cy Coleman, book by Mark Bramble, lyrics by Michael Stewart), was a hit on Broadway in 1980 and ran for more than 850 performances, before coming to the London Palladium in 1981, Read more ...
Jasper Rees
The Woman in White insists on being told and retold. Wilkie Collins’s much loved thriller is perhaps the most widely and frequently adapted of all the great Victorian novels. In Marian Halcombe it has a resourceful heroine whose appeal doesn't rest remotely in her looks, and in Count Fosco with his menagerie of sinister pets it has an impeccably flavoursome villain. No wonder the BBC is unleashing yet another television version, while the Charing Cross Theatre has revived Andrew Lloyd Webber’s 2004 musical in a newly stripped-down version.A first theatrical version found its way onto the Read more ...
Marianka Swain
Everybody’s been talking about Everybody’s Talking About Jamie since its Sheffield Crucible debut earlier this year. It’s unusual to see a musical come steaming into the West End based on word on mouth – not star casting, or association with an existing franchise. Instead, inspired by humble BBC Three documentary Jamie: Drag Queen at 16, Jonathan Butterell’s production is, in every sense of the word, refreshing: a genuine homegrown hit.Jamie New (John McCrea, pictured below right by Johan Persson) has decided he wants to become a drag queen, and to make his grand debut by wearing a dress to Read more ...
Owen Richards
During the 19th century, Tiger Bay in Cardiff was the beating heart of the Industrial Revolution and the most multicultural area in Britain. Visit today and the only signs remaining are the odd gothic buildings that sit between Doctor Who exhibitions and Nandos. The Wales Millennium Centre looks to remind Wales of its history with the debut of an original production, appropriately titled Tiger Bay.Racial and class divides come to the forefront in this large-scale musical. Themba Sibeko (Dom Hartley-Harris) is a recent arrival to Tiger Bay, who just wants to work the docks and forget his past Read more ...