I have always enjoyed the surprise of going to the theatre to see a performance which I have no previous knowledge of, and this was indeed the case when I attended ‘Heathers the Musical’ at the beautiful Theatre Royal, Nottingham. All I had heard was that it was based on a late 80s cult high school drama film, so naturally, themes of: teenage angst, self discovery, popularity, lust, etc, sprang to mind.
To be honest, my friend and I who, being men who’s school days are some decades behind us now, seeing the teenage characters on stage during the first 5 minutes and guessing that we were within the approximate 5% of males in the audience, we exchanged a look expressing “What have we let ourselves in for?”… a concern which, however, I’m pleased to report, was promptly abandoned minutes later as the energy, vibrancy and sense of humour of the story completely absorbed me from there on in.
The main theme revolves around Veronica Sawyer, an intelligent and somewhat geeky high school girl, played brilliantly by Eleanor Walsh, who in order to survive the challenges and cruelties of school life somewhat begrudgingly seeks protection by joining the cool-girls-gang, the ‘Heathers’ (so called because they’re all called ‘Heather’) played by the fabulous trio of: Verity Thompson, Elise Zavou and Billie Bowman. Veronica then couples up with the mysterious teen rebel named Jason ‘JD’ Dean, played by Jacob Fowler, who leads her astray on a path of murderous intent. In fact every character was played exceedingly well by all the talented actors cast for this play.
Being a stage production frequently punctuated with energetic music and dance, the first song to be blasted out called ‘Candy Store’ really set the scene for what was to come with fantastic energy and vocal talent on display, which, gathering by the raucous cheers of appreciation at the end, was received very well by the audience. An applause as enthusiastic and loud as any I’ve experienced before in the theatre! I certainly chipped in my tuppence worth, too!
The storyline was very engrossing and with a darkness of plot which never fails to captivate the attention as the main protagonists of the story get sequentially “bumped off”. Being a newcomer to ‘Heathers’, I thought the darkness of the plot was beautifully balanced with a great sense of humour, comedy and occasional raunchiness, which relieved the story of any sense of over-seriousness and had us all laughing out loud frequently. On top of this the costumes, vibrant colours, fashions and brilliant musical performances really made for an overall great theatrical experience and fun evening.
In conclusion you could say is that I have finally crawled out from the rock I was hiding under and successfully joined the ‘Heathers’ cult and all thanks to this wonderful stage production. I highly recommend going to enjoy if for yourselves.
Review by James Toomey
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