Lyceum Theatre, Sheffield – until 4 July 2026
Reviewed by Lauren Fordham
5*****
Priscilla Queen of the Desert The Musical is based on the 1994 film ‘The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. ‘Priscilla’ is about drag queens Tick/‘Mitzi’ (Kevin Clifton) and Adam/‘Felicia, (Nick Hayes) and trans woman Bernadette (Adele Anderson) who join together to road trip across Australia to perform and also for Tick to meet his nine-year-old son, Benji, for the first time.
It is a raucous riot of colour, light and sound thanks to Andrew Exeter’s set design. Highlights include a spinning disco ball as the curtain rises on each act, the ‘pun-derfully’ pointed Cock (atoo) sign delineating the Sydney club at which the show opens, and of course the gorgeously garish ‘Priscilla’ tour bus. Exeter’s lighting spans rainbows and trans flag colours but also a naturalistic sunrise at Ayers’ Rock, the group’s final destination. Contrasting as that does with the aggressive, urgent flashing lights illuminating the transphobic attack on Bernadette in the bar, it adds an extra layer of symbolism that queer people can rise out of the darkness, into the (spot)light and that even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise. (Forgive the mixing of musicals and metaphors.)
Vicky Gill’s costume design is equally as flashy and flamboyant as Exeter’s lighting and just as effective, dressing Felicia and fellow drag queens full of feathers and flounce. Her simpler choices also signify the blurring of the gender identity lines within the characters and in much of the queer community as a whole. Tick, who is married to a woman, but attracted to men, wears a pink crop top and blue shorts – the colours of the trans flag.
Although Kevin Clifton, who plays Tick, is more than at ease with demanding, complex movement given his Strictly Come Dancing background, I actually found his slower scenes, when he dances with son Benji, impersonating Elvis and singing ‘Always on my Mind’ more impactful and sincere than the faster numbers like Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. At this performance Benji was played fantastically by Forrest Mahjouri, who definitely brought a lump to this reviewer’s throat with his unfailingly endearing, earnest acceptance of his nervous dad’s identity and job in what Tick euphemistically describes as ‘show biz.’
Billie Hardy also deserves praise as Tick’s estranged wife Marion, who still manages to put their son’s need for his father above her own frustrations of his nine-year exodus from his so-called family.
In the disco anthem Sisters Are Doing It For themselves, played in the interval, Annie Lennox and Aretha Franklin sang that ‘behind every man there had to be a great woman’ and nowhere is this demonstrated more clearly in ‘Priscilla’ than through the three Divas. Played by, Leah Vassell (Diva 1) Bernadette Bangura (Diva 2) and Jessie May (Diva 3) their passionate, powerful pipes would be equally at home in the heavens as Muses in Disney’s Hercules: The Musical or for Bangura and Vassell, perhaps one of the Dreamgirls.
On the one hand, I loved the maternal relationship between Bernadette (Adèle Anderson) and Adam/Felicia (Nick Hayes) when she comforts him after he is attacked going out in full drag in Coober Pedy. But I also felt uncomfortable when he was deadnaming her because that is highly taboo for cis people to do, so it felt like a double standard that was awkward to witness and understand. This discomfort was quickly overridden however, by the refreshing joyousness of her natural budding relationship with Bob (Peter Duncan) who is likeable and endears himself to the audience as like Benji, he defies the audience’s expectations and accepts her for exactly who she is. After all, the greatest thing is to love and be loved in return.
I hope I have been sufficiently convincing that you belong in a seat on this tour bus by July 4th before it rumbles off to its next venue, and I guarantee that, cis or trans, boy/man, non-binary person, woman or girl, you will definitely have a lot of fun!