Phenomenal deliberation seems to have
gone into this show. Gurinder Chadha’s 2002 film was rather a surprise
success, but the dozen years since she first mooted a stage musical
version have apparently allowed time for meticulous planning of how the
work should be shaped and pitched.
The story of 18-year-old Sikh girl Jesminder and her countercultural
(even for the community in Southall, west London) obsession with
playing football is driven with precision, both in narrative terms and
as a metaphor for bending the rules like a ball’s trajectory in order
to follow one’s own path. We get a love triangle, a healthy dose of
LGBT solidarity largely through byplay and misunderstandings, and of
course a spicy base of Anglo-Punjabi mash-up culture, with some sitar
and harmonium-based arrangements and an Act Two sequence in which
choreographer Aletta Collins smartly represents the football team’s
climactic match by weaving them in and out of the guests at Jess’s
sister’s wedding which is going on at the same time.
The joy is that, against all expectation, this detailed calculation
doesn’t stifle the vibrancy of story and characters one iota; rather,
it marshals everything in energetic aid of it. Composer Howard Goodall
is a master of musical idioms and knows how much or how little exotica
to include in any given number without simply falling into pastiche.
Charles Hart’s lyrics are clever but never clever-clever, as befits the
librettist of
The Phantom Of The
Opera. Natalie Dew gives a winning performance as Jess;
Twilight and
Harry Potter alumnus Jamie Campbell
Bower offers youthful eye candy as coach Joe (and also gets the
breakout musical number “More Fool Me”); Sophie-Louise Dann is deftly
comedic as Paula, the mother of team captain Jules (Lauren Samuels),
Jess’s best friend and her rival for Joe’s affections; Tony Jayawardena
deserves more attention than I can give here as Jess’s father, trying
to reconcile his own bitter experiences with a new world of hopes and
opportunities.
The relevant context for the show, I think, is not the burgeoning genre
of movie-to-stage musical, but rather the Phoenix Theatre’s recent
history of hosting slightly left-field, not always feelgood but always
affirmative musicals such as
Once
and, for nearly 25 years,
Blood
Brothers. It should make the Beckses feel right at home.
Written for the Financial
Times.