Hope Mill Theatre, Manchester – until 4th March 2023
Reviewed by Matthew North
2**
Every now and then, a musical sounds like a great idea on paper and that great idea translates beautifully to the stage. Is this the case for Head Over Heels?
The short answer is that I’m afraid it isn’t.
Despite a cast overflowing with charm and talent, this show just feels adrift in quite a severe identity crisis. The plot is convoluted, the characters paper thin and the book plodding bordering on painful for the majority. Any musical including the back catalogue of The Go-Go’s isn’t exactly short of an array of cracking songs, but here they just feel shoe horned in for the most part and generally add even more confusion to an already muddy affair.
The Direction and Choreography by Tom Jackson Greaves goes some way toward providing some much needed clarity to proceedings but also noticeably lacks any moments of real stillness to let the stories and relationships on show to actually breathe and establish themselves in any meaningful way. The stage often feels chaotic and crowded – and whilst the near constant movement and shifting does give this production a real momentum and pacey feel, it’s hard not to feel left behind in a confused daze.
In the midst of all this, there really are some cracking performances from the 12 strong company. Highlights including a truly glorious performance from Iz Hesketh as Pythio, bringing a shimmering beauty and fantastic voice, a beautifully controlled vocal and some spot on line deliveries from Luke Bayer as Musidorus and Jenny O’Leary as Pamela. O’Leary brings an undeniable command of the stage and the vocal performance of the night – every time she appeared on the stage, the production suddenly went into a whole other gear. The portrayal of her relationship with Mopsa (a very charming Khadija Sallet) was played with the kind of sensibility the rest of the production would have really benefited from.
There’s no denying this production does raise a smile on multiple occasions (I can’t imagine a single audience member will sit there stone faced) but can I see the show moving on from here, or becoming a staple? Sadly not. Maybe that’s just me. It’s not that its out and out a bad show, nor do I feel like I’ve now seen one of those big musical flops that fans like to collect, it’s just something that didn’t work for me.