Back To The Future: The Musical

(seen at the second preview performance, afternoon 21st August 2021)

Great, Scott? Depends a bit if Scott is a once-a-year or fewer visitor to West End shows, a regular or a professional reviewer, thinks the monkey.

Assuming Scott is the first, he’s going to love it. A cherished classic movie is filleted by Bob Gale to create an amusingly engaging storyline. Alan Silvestri and Glen Ballard drop in songs to which Chris Bailey adds energetic 80s dance routines for an appropriately dressed ensemble.

Tim Hatley, Tim Lutkin, Gareth Owen, Chris Fisher and Finn Ross create scenery, video, sound, lighting, and special effects which keep the show kinetic and add both wit and “wow factor” throughout the evening.

Olly Dobson (Marty McFly) and Roger Bart (Doc Brown) match their screen counterparts – with added song-and-dance ability. A confused teenager / eccentric genius double act who make carrying the show together look effortless (once Doc can get his helmet on – preview problem, in joke!). Bart could potentially be in the trophy line – and not just for “Best Flux Capacitor.”

There’s outstanding work too from Aidan Cutler as bully Biff, menacing meathead par-excellence. His victim Hugh Coles (George McFly) demonstrates his acting versatility in his final scene, while wife Rosanna Hyland (Lorraine Baines) makes a lot of a very small role supporting him and put-upon sister Emma Lloyd (Linda McFly).

Outside of the family, Cedric Neal in the dual role of Goldie Wilson and Marvin Berry should also be checking his inbox at awards time.

The ensemble is well-drilled, with an energy probably powering the lighting around the proscenium. The monkey was particularly delighted to note Bessy Ewa and Nic Myers among them. It saw them both in their Arts Ed graduation show “Freaky Friday” just weeks before their career-paths crumbled before their eyes. The joy in seeing them book wonderful West End roles is endless.

So, Scott, his family and friends will leave the theatre having had a pretty great time. The show will suit particularly families with teenage boys who show no inclination towards anything except technology – if they don’t connect with this, nothing will help until those hormones settle down in around 10 years or so.

And then we come to the theatre regulars and professional reviewers. The main question they will probably ask is “why did anyone think it was a particularly good idea to make the successful movie into a stage show in the first place, let alone a musical?”

On the plus side, the storytelling is possibly superior to the film in trimming off excesses. The show zips along without lag, and whether you choose to appreciate the decently choreographed dance routines as stops along the way or find them unwanted interruptions is personal choice.

The brutally frank musical afficionado may feel that there isn’t a new song in the show which sticks in the memory longer than five minutes. “It Works” is probably the best, but further in there are some real mis-fires, notably the 11’O Clock number “For The Dreamers” which lacks the pathos to sell its idea as intended. The rhyming dictionary is a little too often at hand, though mostly deployed to bring needed levity.

This all alas lends a coldness to proceedings for most of the show as the music fails to assist in building much relationship between audience and characters. That seems to be assumed - and with many of them hardly on-stage for much of the night, it is impossible to grow it through the evening.

For the monkey, it makes the show feel at times reduced to a bit of a two-hander. There are too few opportunities for the female characters to shine, leading to something of an imbalance which multiple “ladies’ only” dance routines do not really redress.

The main saving grace of the show for the regular theatregoer is that it is done with good humour, some neat visual gags and self-awareness. The trouble is that it goes too far at times (could have done without the virus material, though the audience loved it) and there are many ancient theatrical tropes and effects which are fun only for those who have never seen them before. Still, odd outbursts of genuine raucous laughter assist greatly, particularly towards the end.

Given that it does exactly what the wonderfully themed foyer promises, providing a little time-travel to an entertaining place, the monkey would say it is looking at a very popular hit with the public, if not one with the professional reviewers - just going by the audience reaction around it.

This will probably disturb the time-continuum of the Adelphi for at least a year or two and should be on the list of any family whose own Marty and Linda need educating in just what their parents didn’t do, and the consequences of it.