A disappointing production that turns a fascinating life into a boring show with unmemorable songs
This show is a two-hander telling the life story of the famous mathematician and computer scientist Alan Turing in a musical format. It stars Joe Bishop and Zara Cooke, who were also the original performers from the show’s debut at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2022. It was written by Joan Greening, composed by Joel Goodman, and directed by Jane Miles, but I doubt that this production will be a career highlight for anyone involved.
This show bills itself as a musical biography, and perhaps that is a better way to describe it than a theatrical show. It ably informs you of the key aspects of Alan Turing’s life, but does not seem too concerned about doing so in an entertaining way. I was perplexed as to what the point of view or vision of this show was, beyond wanting to give people the highlights of what happened in Alan Turing’s life. More of a musical lecture than a musical show. I was yearning for some kind of exploration of who Turing was as a person, or some new way of looking at what he achieved, but this entire production was very face value and missing a discernible theme, message, or reason for existing.
A lot of my qualms regarding the lack of narrative throughline or unique perspective, could have been forgiven if the show was particularly entertaining. However, it fails on this point as well. The music itself is not very memorable, with the only song that I responded positively to being in the latter half of the show with Turing running a marathon and solving the enigma code. Other than this, the music is just there without adding any greater emotion of interest to the show. This was not helped by some peculiar sound mixing choices, with the actors’ microphones sometimes being too loud or too quiet, and the music being too quiet throughout.
The performances themselves were steady if unremarkable, with competent but unexceptional singing. At times the music and singing did not seem to match up, with the actors sometimes trying to catch up to the music, or having to leave some awkward pauses while the music catches up to them. This again could have been a sound issue with the actors potentially not being able to hear the music clearly, but the overall effect was the songs seeming stilted and lacking energy. Zara Cooke, who played every role other than Alan Turing, had the thankless task of trying to bring to life characters, who did not seem to have much more about them other than being someone for Turing to talk to. None of these characters seemed distinct enough from the other in either costuming or performance, and so you had to try and glean from the context as to what character was currently on stage.
The script and story felt like it needed the most work. There was a bizarre choice early on in the show to focus on the death of one of Turing’s childhood friends for quite a long time, with no clear reason for this. We have Turing and the friend’s mother grieving on stage, but we have only just met Turing and we had not met the friend’s mother prior to her grieving (and we never see her again after this), so what was meant to be an emotional moment just fell flat. It is also not at all clear as to why this was focused on so much. It is not mentioned again and does not seem to add much if anything to the story or our understanding of who Turing was.
There is an exciting and entertaining story to be told about Alan Turing, and if you know nothing about him then you will leave this show with more knowledge than you went in with, but I would personally recommend reading his Wikipedia page rather than going to see this show.