An exceptional retelling of the cautionary tale of journalistic hubris
The story of Elton John’s defamation case against The Sun newspaper is well established among journalists, both aspiring and established. The infamous “sordid rent-boy orgy” stories published by Sun editor Kelvin MacKenzie, and the subsequent lawsuits they prompted, are now a staple of UK media law teaching and a stark reminder of the excesses of tabloid journalism at its most reckless.
Henry Naylor’s Monstering the Rocketman, which he also performs, dramatises the affair with precision and urgency. The play skilfully navigates the tension between ambition and truth, exposing the moral compromises demanded by an industry that often prioritises career progression over basic journalistic integrity.
At the centre of the play is a doe-eyed junior reporter, affectionately nicknamed Lynx after his penchant for the deodorant of the same name, who also serves as the narrator. Eager to make his name in the prime of Fleet Street, Lynx secures work experience at The Sun, the nation’s most-read newspaper. There, he is placed under the tutelage of the grizzled tabloid veteran Jane and the maniacal editor Kelvin MacKenzie. He is quickly thrown in at the deep end, tasked with covering the nation’s favourite performer’s alleged depraved sex parties and claims that purportedly included underage boys.
As is common in the tabloid press, Lynx soon discovers that editors grant themselves a generous degree of creative licence when it comes to the truth. This tendency is heightened by the bitter rivalry between the two most-read papers of the time, The Sun and the Mirror. Some of the stories produced during this period, such as the one about Elton John, were not merely exaggerated but entirely fabricated. Lynx is forced to grapple with his desire to climb the career ladder, no matter how undignified, against his commitment to truth and basic human decency.
Writer and performer Henry Naylor and director Darren Lee Cole make particularly effective use of the play’s set, periodically pasting real tabloid front pages from the era onto the stage. These moments are shocking reminders of just how malicious and invasive the tactics of the red tops were. One especially haunting example is the 4 May 1982 headline that The Sun ran following the sinking of the ARA General Belgrano during the Falklands War — an act that some historians argue meets the legal threshold to be considered a war crime. The headline reads simply: GOTCHA. This is without even mentioning the overwhelming stench of homophobia that marinated much of the copy directed at Elton John.
Naylor’s writing addresses this dark period of journalism through an effective metaphor in which the ink on the page rubs off on, and permeates, the populace that consumes it, shaping the nation’s collective psyche both literally and figuratively.
The play also feels timely. Nearly four decades after The Sun published the ‘rent-boy’ story at the centre of Monstering the Rocketman, Elton John has once again found himself in court, arguing that his privacy has been breached by tabloid journalists. In a recent today, he said “I have found the Mail’s deliberate invasion into my medical health and medical details surrounding the birth of our son Zachary abhorrent and outside even the most basic standards of human decency,” — words that resonate all the more powerfully after watching Monstering the Rocketman.