Forgotten Musicals: ‘Soho Cinders’ (2011)

Forgotten Musicals: ‘Soho Cinders’   (2011)

Book by Anthony Drewe & Elliot Davies  

Lyrics by Anthony Drewe 

Music by George Stiles

History:

George Stiles and Anthony Drewe ('Betty Blue Eyes', 'Mary Poppins', 'Honk', 'The Three Little Pigs') started work on 'Soho Cinders' in 2000, having come up with the idea of updating a very basic version of Cinderella into something different in the 1990s. In the summer of 2000, they sat in Regents Park to start developing their adaptation and wrote a lot of it in France at Stiles' sister-in-law's house.Although the musical was almost finished, the pair had been busy with other projects which hindered their progress.Workshops for the musical began in the early 2000s but it was not until 6th July 2008 that some of the musical's songs were exclusively premiered at Her Majesty's Theatre as part of a gala concert that celebrated the 25th anniversary of Stiles and Drewe's songwriting partnership, entitled 'A Spoonful of Stiles and Drewe'. 

It then had a gala concert production at the Queen's Theatre on 9th October 2011 in aid of Teenage Cancer Trust. The concert, which was supported by Whatsonstage.com, was sold-out and featured a cast of West End performer. In 2012, Soho Cinders received its world premiere as a full-scale production at Soho Theatre, running from 3rd August to 9th September 2012.

Plot:

'Soho Cinders' is a modern musical fable that is set and celebrates the London district of Soho which mixes politics, sex-scandals and true love in a story about an impoverished student Robbie, who is paying for his college bills in a somewhat unorthodox way, becoming romantically involved with the engaged prospective mayoral candidate James Prince. James and Robbie's worlds collide forcing them to fight for their own fairy-tale ending in this hilarious, satirical twist on the classic Cinderella story.

In a Nutshell: 

Are fairy tale endings possible in real life ?

Production:

The production that I saw was at the Union Theatre in Southwark (10 minutes walk from Waterloo Station, or 5 minutes from Southwark Station), where a month before I had seen a disappointing production of the musical 'Moby Dick'  (There's only so many times that '__ years at sea, and still no sign of Dick' is funny). The show opened on 23rd November 2016, and I excitedly caught the second night, due to 'Betty Blue Eyes' (Drewe & Stiles) and 'Loserville'  (Elliot Davis) being two of my favourite musicals of recent years. The auditorium has moveable seating, and no actual stage, and in this case, seats were at the top and bottom of the hall with the action happening in the middle.

Our hero Robbie (Joshua Lewindon), the 'Cinders' of the piece, took a while to sing loud enough to be clearly heard over the band, but it was with the introduction of the main female characters that the show really took off for me. First his evil step-sisters, Clodagh (Michaela Stern) and Dana (Natalie Harman) appeared to throw him out of his late mother's flat and demand rent for the family launderette (a hint of 'Aladdin' creeping in), then were were introduced to his best friend, Velcro (Emily Deamer)  [geddit?] who runs the laundry with him, and who for me was the emotional heart of the show.  I found Robbie's daliances with both a middle-aged peer (Chris Coleman) and a mayoral candidate (Lewis Asquith) not as engaging as I would have liked, mainly due to the likely fall-out for other characters of any 'happy ending' but any musical number involving the Sisters or Velcro seemed to fly. The first Act ended with the remarkably catchy, 'You Shall Go To the Ball', and I was itching for it to start again. With Robbie and James' secret out, it was down to spin-doctor, William George (Samuel Haughton) to salvage what he could, both for James and himself. I also must praise Lowri Walton who was playing Marilyn Platt, James' fiancee, for all her scenes after the revelation, in particular her duet, 'Let Him Go', with Velcro. Happy endings were reached for some, with promises of happiness to come for others, and the action was ending with a full ensemble-version of 'You Shall Go To The Ball'. Very highly recommended.

'Soho Cinders' runs at the Union Theatre in London from 23rd November 2016 to 22nd December 2016.

Signature Song:

Once again I find it difficult to choose - my emotional side wants 'Let Him Go' and my fun side wants either of the Sisters' big numbers 'I'm So Over Men' and 'Fifteen Minutes' (a song easily customisable to current 15-minuters, such as Honey G) or Velcro's 'It's Hard to Tell' (about the difficulty in working out which men are gay and which are straight)

Links: 

Production website.
Some of the songs can be found here.