Since We Will Rock You first premiered in London, iPhones have been invented, the Metaverse created, and artificial intelligence threatens to put us all out of a job. All of which hurtles us even closer to the dystopian future that Ben Elton dreamed up over two decades ago, and in which the musical based on the music of Queen is set. It returns now for its first London revival since it closed at the Dominion, for a relatively short run at the London Coliseum.
In a world run by one giant corporation, Globalsoft, and its CEO The Killer Queen, only music programmed by the company exists. Kids never look up from their phones (maybe we’re closer to that future than we first thought) and the start of show information tells us no-one meets up in person and gatherings don’t take place.
Until the first scene. It’s a gathering of school kids on their graduation day, from the school where they’ve clearly been gathered together for a number of years. We know this because the teacher is a spy for Globalsoft, who reports Galileo Figaro for trying to make a musical instrument in class. Along with a girl who’ll later be known as Scaramouche, the young dreamer escapes, hooks up with the Bohemians and sets off on a quest for freedom and rock ‘n’ roll.
Many modern references have been added, but a lot of the ‘jokes’ (you can use that term loosely) are terribly dated and it doesn’t seem to make sense that if the book was being rewritten anyway you wouldn’t weed out the references to Teletubbies and Mr Blobby. Mind you, not much of the story actually makes sense, the running gag of mispronouncing words from the ‘past’ quicky gets tired, then becomes irritating.
But most of the We Will Rock You audience aren’t there for the plot, they want to hear the music, and the We Will Rock You orchestrations of Queen anthems are superb. The vocals from the two leads, Ian McIntosh (Galielo) and Elena Skye (Scaramouche) are outstanding, and this would be a hit show even if it was only them on stage singing the songs with nothing else happening.
Strangely, this revival does seem to struggle to fill the vast Coliseum stage, it feels a bit like it’s been done on the cheap with recycled graphics from the original production, in fact everything feels a bit cheesier than it did before. Brenda Edwards and Lee Mead as Killer Queen and Khashoggi are reduced to third rate panto villains making beaver jokes.
Lacklustre choreography doesn’t do anyone on stage any favours, but maybe it’s a combination of Elton being both writer and director that makes the book feel so dated. Elton also makes his stage debut as the rebel leader, which includes an attempt at a song, thankfully it doesn’t last too long.
This is a disappointing revival of the cult musical, though We Will Rock You still manages to draw huge audience numbers who are delighted by the music and endless rock references. I would have been more than happy to listen to Ian McIntosh and Elena Skye sing all night long, but it seems the outdated script is the price we have to pay for this particular kind of magic.
