“A promising story but a production that needs work”
Let me start this review with the reasons you SHOULD go see this show.
Firstly and most importantly to support new British musical theatre writing. It is imperative to support young and upcoming writers and only by watching and supporting fringe productions can they come through the ranks. An MMD survey recently showed woeful figures for female led work in musical theatre productions and so I applaud Molly for getting this work seen.
Secondly, the story and viewpoint feels important – with the media becoming more powerful than ever, the impact of that cycle of abuse is becoming more insidious and reflecting that through the medium of theatre is exactly what we should be doing.
Annie Thorpe as Charley shines in this piece – I was astounded to find Scottish is not her native accent. Vocally she commands the songs and her final piece leaves the room vibrating – a real pleasure to listen too. Shannon Davidson as Kat carries the mental health performances with charisma and nuance – the character struggling with multiple illnesses is not an easy thing to pull off with care and Shannon does this.
The story sees two child star sisters, both emotionally worse for the wear, reunited 5 years after the older sister leaves. The era/setting is vague – on one hand it feels very musical hall – reminiscent of Baby June and Gypsy Rose Lee, the child stars of days gone by. But then we have plumbers and mobiles and modern references which muddy and cloud the piece. The script tries to squeeze many issues into the very small window overwhelming the clarity and impact, for example we hear about:
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Sexual Assault
- Bereavement
- Grooming
- Media
- Bulimia
- Suicidal Ideation
- Drug Addiction
- Coercive Control
- Trauma Bonding
- Abandonment
It is easy to see the potential of these themes linking but what has happened here is none of the stories are fully resolved. Even writing them out like this it becomes clear that it may be a bit too ambitious to tell all those stories in one tale.
Other writing issues are apparent in cliche choices and conversions where the characters aren’t listening to each other. Often contradicting themselves – particularly David (although David’s character is our stereotypical manipulator). Clearly written as the villain, Simon Mulligan – who plays David – has a hard task creating a believable truthful performance.
Musically the piece has a few really lovely tunes, particularly early on, the Plummer song has a simplicity about it which really lends itself to the narrative. The music suffers from a similar issue to the ‘period’ one, there are songs which are pastiche’s of a style which age the show where it could be fresher and modern. Ideally the ‘performance’ songs should be more stylistically separate to the soliloquies.
Production wise, the space is utilised disappointingly – with a thrust audience it would’ve been nice to see them creatively use the sides. Choreography was awkward and honestly if your actors can’t dance or aren’t dancers there are some choices to be made – make it that the character can’t dance – but having multiple dance routines left the audience all feeling uncomfortable.
Overall there is potential in the story and I look forward to the piece growing.