[AD – PR*]
★★
The brilliance of heading to fringe festivals is being able to see productions early in their journey. This weekend at Brighton Fringe I watched two new musicals at The Actors Theatre, the first being ‘Joan: The Musical’: a Wonderland-inspired journey of self-confidence by Hannah Doyle and Melanie Bell, featuring some songs about self-belief. It is directed by Summer Tewkesbury and encourages a 70-something to look inside herself and realise her self worth.
Tumbling down a rabbit hole
The musical begins with Joan (Geraldine Afifi) shopping for outfits for an upcoming event. Whilst browsing the rails, the character expresses a lack of self-confidence over what to wear and declares that she’ll never find anything by Friday. Suddenly the character falls down a rabbit hole into self-care guru Sky’s (Lauren Skellett) lair, where she must learn to see herself differently, before returning home.
Whilst with Sky and her assistant Ben (Dean Flynn), Joan encounters a fellow ‘trauma traveller’ Ryan (Justin Hillier), who is also at a crossroads in their life. It takes the focus away from Joan, which is to the production’s detriment. My core issue with the piece is that there are too many characters featured. Sky can be likened to a Fairy Godmother character and the material would be much stronger taking a step back and focusing on these two women, whose companionship could help each other immensely. Life isn’t perfect for Sky either and the sweet limited scenes with Joan and Sky really ought to be expanded upon.
Limited context
In my opinion, there is not enough time to appreciate Joan’s personal situation at the start of the show, before she tumbles down the rabbit hole. There are some lines about a past career as a West End dancer and living in Seven Dials, but there is limited opportunity to really get to know the character, before she is transported ‘Alice and Wonderland style’ to Sky’s magical land of self-belief. The material could benefit from more focus on Joan’s sense of character, replacing the noise of the self-care fantasyland.
Overall thoughts
I like the messaging, which encourages audiences to always believe in themselves, no matter their age, but for me as a musical it’s quite limited in its current form. With fewer characters and a core focus on Joan and Sky, this could be a lovely story of intergenerational friendship, but it is not there yet. ‘Joan: The Musical’ has one final performance at The Actors Theatre on Monday 26th May 2025, with tickets available via the festival’s website. I will be interested to hear how it develops after Brighton Fringe.
Thanks for reading my blog today.
Love Kat xxxx
*My ticket for ‘Joan: The Musical’ was gifted in exchange for an unbiased review.
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