Birmingham Hippodrome – until Sunday 27th April 2025
Reviewed by Nadia Dodd
4****
The Orphan Train Movement was a supervised welfare program that transported orphaned and homeless children from crowded Eastern cities of the United States to foster homes located largely in rural areas of the Midwest. The orphan trains operated between 1850’s and 1920’s.
This show is based on the children who would travel the orphan train line, to be paraded in front of ‘well off’ families with the hope of finding the best family ever to live with and love. That was what they all dreamed of. Some children did get chosen, those boys who looked strong to be able to in fields, and those girls who were taken to the family home to become maids, all free labour and not to a loving family after all.
The children not chosen were to become the children in the naughty carriage and this story follows them. Learning about their playful, curious characters through song and vibrant choreography.
Written by Carl Miller and Luke Saydon, the British Music Youth Theatre performed such a high quality production, made up of cast between the ages of 11-21 years.
The voices of the whole cast together was so captivating, I forgot at times this is ‘youth’ theatre as they were completely professional and seemed so at ease with performing to an audience of almost 200 people.
The music, also written and composed by Carl and Luke covered a lot of emotions. The poor sad unfortunate orphans, happier times when the more fortunate got ‘chosen’ and onto some real tap tapping upbeat songs that the complete ensemble raise the roof with.
Staging is basic but so effective at the same time. Its mainly set on the train carriage of course, but you see the platforms, a couple of the houses that some of the children were taken to hopefully to have found their forever family and you can imagine the farms and fields where the free child labour was taking place. All this was created with the change of lighting, a few props and our imagination.
Touching, empowering and some funny stories throughout this play, directed by Emily Gray.
Tickets are still available, suitable for children 6years plus so a real great family show. The production is advertised as 90 minutes long and doesn’t mention an interval but last night there was a brief interlude for those wanting refreshments or to use the facilities.
As it says in the title the British ‘music’ Youth Theatre is not just about acting and singing, the musicians in the show, positioned either side of the stage area playing saxophone, drums, flute and clarinet were also members of the youth theatre, tremendous talent there as I only realised this when I read the programme.
Youth Theatre is all about upskilling, improving confidence and creating future stars of musical theatre. Plenty of potential seen on the stage tonight, a memorable show indeed.