BLOOD BROTHERS, EDINBURGH PLAYHOUSE ***
With the ability to send shivers down the spine, the opening bars of Blood Brothers’ chilling overture sets the mood for what is to come just as much, if not more, than any words the ever-present and sadly, on this occasion, ineffectual Narrator may speak. The sense of unease Willy Russell’s evocative score creates creeps from the pit and into the auditorium from the off, but then with two bodies lying centre stage from the moments the lights come up, Russell’s iconic piece of musical theatre has never been known for its laughs, although there are a few.
If you don’t know the story of the Johnstone Twins, it’s tragic. Opening in the Liverpool of the 1980s, the action quickly flashes back to tell the tale of Mrs Johnstone, a single mother of seven, struggling to feed her family in the city’s poverty stricken Victorian slums. With twins on the way, an absent husband, heavily in debt and unable to support both her new arrivals, Mrs Johnstone agrees to hand one of her twins to her employer, Mrs Lyons, a woman unable to have children of her own and desperate for a child to call her own. And so Mickey and Eddie are born only to grow up apart, in very different worlds, until the day fate reunites them and everyone’s lives change forever.
Even today, some 41 years since it premiered in Liverpool and on London’s West End, Blood Brothers remains a visceral, angry and heart-wrenching piece of theatre, a desolate indictment of the decimation of industry and the working class. It’s also a stark observation of the effects of extreme poverty on the individual and society as a whole. A searing social comment and a spectacular piece of modern theatre, this current tour is not only poignant but timely. It’s also lacking in places.
With haunting numbers like Marilyn Monroe, Tell Me It’s Not True and Miss Jones, Russell’s music and lyrics are timeless and live on in the memory long after the curtain has fallen, in that respect, this production live up to expectations, in others it doesn’t always match what has gone before.
As Mrs Johnstone, Vivienne Carlyle is no stranger to her character’s anguish, having played the role on the West End. Her’s is a quietly subdued performance that captures a woman worn down and broken by circumstance, yet fighting on and hold it her family together. It’s a portrayal that burns slowly, but constantly. If Carlyle is the star billing, she is matched every step of the way by Gemma Brodrick who, as Linda, is totally captivating. Brodrick brings a steely fragility to her role in a show stealing turn that is both funny and heart-breaking and the highlight of the evening.
As for the twins, Sean Jones may Blood Brothers’ royalty having played the role of Mickey on and off for 25 years now, but there’s an imbalance between the Johnstone boys in this production that is hard to overlook. Joe Sleight, a decade and a half Jones’ junior, is Eddie and the discrepancy in energy is tangible. That said, where they work brilliantly together is in their moments of quiet retrospection and physical comedy.
Elsewhere, Scott Anson, reprising the role of the Narrator after a 20 year break, is yet to rediscover the sinister nature of his menacing spectre, lacking presence and gravitas. Sarah Jane Buckley’s melodramatic Mrs Lyons too sits uncomfortably in the mix while James Ledsham’s Sammy, injects a nice childlike energy into the ‘kids’ ensemble’s set pieces.
In truth though, the beauty of Blood Brothers is in Russell’s writing, the piece flows beautifully, the rhythm of the narration hypnotic when nailed, Mickey’s ‘Seven, nearly eight’ speech a sparkling piece of poetry amidst the prose.
Nick Richings lighting design perfectly compliments Andy Walmsley’s claustrophobic council house set, while Dan Samson’s sound design is quite triumphant – although occasionally a lack of enunciation makes some of the company’s lyrics indecipherable. Despite these misgivings, Russell’s immaculate storytelling remains an absorbing, if emotional couple of hours that need to be experienced by everyone, at least once.
Blood Brothers runs at the Edinburgh Playhouse until 28 September. Tickets here. Then on tour, details and tickets here.
