The Susan Boyle Musical -
I Dreamed A Dream - Review

Background
There is no doubt that Susan Boyle's incredibly fast rise to fame from unknown singer to multimillion selling recording artist is one of those few occurrences when, after years of trying, a break comes from a talent show on TV. We have seen a small number of artists finding success through these shows, shows which seem to be ten a penny these days. Of that small number just a handful are seemingly lasting, others only achieving a brief flitting into the limelight to fade and be rarely heard of again. Susan sits firmly in the former category. Three years and three hit CDs later she continues to be a star of the music scene.

That Susan's fame and success is lasting is clear, but her story differentiates her from those other few people who have found real success through the talent show route. Her story is compelling, moving, and touches the soul. This is evidenced by the fact that just three years after her astounding performance on UK television's ITV programme, 'Britain's Got Talent', and its subsequent airing on YouTube, which propelled her at rocket speed to stardom, a musical about her life has been written.

The Musical
The first location was Newcastle's Theatre Royal. The date was 26th March 2012. The curtain rose on the last preview of The Susan Boyle Musical I Dreamed A Dream. Subsequently I watched this production twice more. Firstly on it's premiere at Newcastle and then at the Hippodrome, Bristol.

This production pulled no punches. It is very much a literal translation of Susan's life, almost a documentary, with a mix of music from Susan's history and vignettes from her past. While it contained no surprises, as no documentary can, there are interesting theatrical styles used to portray certain parts of Susan's life.

Act One
The set is stark, the backdrop of a wall of TV screens bemusing those who do not know how Susan came to fame. This is a no frills set. Those wanting a lush set will be disappointed. However, the set works extremely well for the whole performance. The minimalistic approach and use of cast members to scene shift makes for a smooth flowing, visual experience.

Opening at Susan's birth, Susan (Elaine C Smith) takes a documentary style of reflective comment from her perspective of today. This continues throughout the performance to a greater or lesser extent and successfully overcomes the difficulty of presenting a biography of a living person whose career is current. Elaine is competent in the role with similar looks and good voice but appears a bit more confident as Susan telling her story than the real Susan might be. There is a 'freeze' effect with the cast becoming motionless as Susan recounts memories from earlier experiences. This effect adds to the 'documentary' feel and puts the musical in temporal context.

The birth scene handles the harshness of maternity care in the early 1960s quite well. However, the doctor (Alan McHugh) is unconvincing, taking the harshness quite literally in his delivery. This first scene, unsurprisingly, introduces Mr and Mrs Boyle, Susan's parents Pat and Bridie (James Paterson and Karen Mann). They play the roles sensitively and convincingly, appearing throughout act one and occasionally in act two as voices from the graves.

Susan's school years and the trial of bullying is forcefully represented, starting with another documentary style introduction by the schoolteacher, exampling the hurtful nature of adolescents. This is followed by a dark and emotive scene which represents the terror of bullying in a novel way through hard hitting choreography. This scene introduces John, Susan's 'would be' boyfriend (Gordon Cooper). John is portrayed sympathetically. The ultimate failure of the relationship leaves one with a good deal of sadness for him and for Susan, whom we know will not find love in the time of her life that the musical chronicles.

This takes us to Susan's life as a young adult, which includes the first of the two unconvincing scenes, the 'Happy Valley Karaoke'. Harry Gordeno (Andy Gray) as MC overdoes the 'cheesy' nature of those events. This may be for the benefit of those who have not experienced the ear-splitting pain of a typical karaoke evening, but I doubt that it needs to be as over the top as it was. However, Andy Gray is amusing in the role, and he also delivers a more believable portrayal in the role of Susan's Uncle Tommy. He also appears in other guises later in the show to good effect. Apart from the karaoke scene, this period of Susan's life is shown touchingly with glimpses into a close knit family's home life.

The other scene that fails dismally occurs towards the end of act one. Susan visits a voice coach, Fred O'Neil (David Haydn). The scene has a gratuitous joke about Susan's weight and little other meaningful content. The musical would benefit from the removal of this scene or, preferably, the development of it into a more believable reflection upon Susan's desire to improve her singing performance. Consultation with Mr O'Neil during the writing process may well have helped.

Act Two
Early in act two we are taken behind the scenes at the Britain's Got Talent audition. Building on the short segment of the pre-audition that appeared on YouTube, this scene takes a wonderfully tongue in cheek poke at the whole talent show concept. The appearance of the TV Runner (Frances Mayli McCann - who also played the nurse at Susan's birth) and Susan's frantic arrival at the audition provides a perfect situation to expose the dichotomy of the upper middle class TV gentry and the contestant taking part in the show. The scene moves on to become quite satirical. The use of Steelers Wheel's number 'Stuck in the middle with you' is an inspired choice to carry the ludicrousness of the talent show genre to the audience. This scene also carries the most powerful use of the huge multi TV backdrop - the mock TVs displaying actual TV footage from the audition.

Act two continues to cover the aftermath of that competition, embracing Susan's loss to the dance troupe 'Diversity' and the huge impact of becoming an overnight sensation. In this and ensuing scenes more and more use is made of a mechanism to indicate the intrusions into Susan's life in the form of a repeated, progressively louder knocking at an imaginary door. Susan's repeated response, 'Leave me alone', delivers her increasing pain and insecurity in a believable and powerful way.

A scene explaining Susan's time at a place of refuge (The Priory) to escape the pressure and to relieve the tiredness that had gathered from the sudden immersion into 24x7 attention is touching and will put to rest any misguided belief that Susan had 'gone crazy'. It is a clear presentation of how such a huge and sudden change of lifestyle can take its toll on a person.

The spirit of Susan's mother appears and in an emotional and hard hitting scene tells Susan to pull herself together and get on with it. The appearance of Susan's parents after their death adds power to the show and reflects Susan's total loyalty to, and love for them.

We meet a symbolic tabloid reporter in the the form of Gavin Jackson (Andy Gray) who delivers the nice/nasty low-life reporter convincingly, creating a great deal of sympathy for Susan amongst the audience. His appearance as a 'black hat' character is balanced by another convincing portrayal - this being Andy Stephens (Jeffery Harmer), who becomes Susan's manager and appears as a counter-balance 'white hat' character.

There follows a dramatic dance scene using facsimiles of the tabloids which occasionally applauded Susan but generally made her the subject of jest and hurtful ridicule. This scene portrays the grim side of the tabloid press (Is there any other side to them?) and the questionable value of talent shows in a fairly dark, brooding way.

Although the Andy Stephens' character is portrayed in a believable way, his sweetness and concern for Susan hides the harsh fact that many managers are imposed on the artist by the management companies. As such, it is in their interest to protect the 'assets'; in this case, Susan. The show does not convey this element of most management techniques.

The act continues into scenes covering Susan's experiences in the recording studio. Little emphasis is put on family or background in this latter part of the show. The pressure of countless interviews, appearances at venues across the globe and the totally alien nature of this to Susan is tempered by Andy Stephens who encourages her gently to accept that she can succeed. This part seems a little unconvincing from Susan's point of view.

Whether it is intended by the writers, or merely co-incidental, this scene does appear to suggest that Andy Stephen's concern for Susan has a hidden agenda, that being the fulfilment of the needs of the management company above those of Susan. There is a lot 'between the lines', and for those in the music industry the cynicism of managers needs no further explanation.

Summary
This musical is amusing and touching. It reflects on Susan's life, her devotion to her parents and her religion in a convincing way. It is an honest and human story told well with a great performance from Elaine C Smith. It is rags to riches with no unnecessary window dressing. The hurt, pain and difficulties are exposed and at times are quite raw.

This is a 'jukebox musical' as there is no original score. The music is from Susan's life, from pop to hymns. These are played adequately by competent musicians using well mixed backing tracks.

Based on viewing this musical 3 times, I consider the production rates 4 out of 5.

Copyright 2012 Nic Lewis.