Mickey Jo (0:00)

So here's the thing. Ever since the musical Six became this enormous global sensation in the West End, on Broadway, on cruise ships, touring, and now with a bunch of new international productions, producers have been looking for that next show that is going to give them the same level of success. What is the Next Six? Similarly, a lot of musical theatre writers have been trying to emulate the contemporary sensibility of this show's score and its appeal with young audiences to try and write the next six. But what do you do if. If you happen to be the songwriters who did write six and the whole world is looking to see what you do next? Well, now finally we know. Oh my God. Hey. Welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. My name is Mickey Jo and I am obsessed with all things theatre. This is my theatre themed channel where I talk about the shows that I get to go and see. I do reviews, we talk about theatre news, and today I want to talk to you about a show I literally just got back from. I need you to know that it is 1:00am right now, but it's very important I bring you this video. So this evening I bought myself a ticket to go and see a performance of a workshop production of a new musical called why Am I so Single? And as you may now have worked out, this new musical was very significant because it has been written by Toby Marlowe and Lucy Moss, AKA the award winning writers behind the musical Six. And this is the first musical that they are unveiling since the success of Six. So while this video is not going to be a review of this new show because it's not yet really in a position where it can be reviewed, this is still a developmental process. This is still a workshop presentation. I am going to be telling you as much information as I think I should about the show at this point. I'm going to let you know how it maybe compares with Six, what it's like as a show, what it's about, what the songs are like, what you might be able to expect if you have bought yourself a ticket to go and see this workshop. Generally, not too much gets divulged about shows during this process and during this part of their life cycle. However, the decision to do a public and ticketed workshop and to charge £25 per ticket, I think opens them up to a little bit more public scrutiny. So, like I said, I'm not going to be reviewing, but I am going to be reporting on it in a sense, because here's the thing, Marlo and Moss have become some of the most eagerly Anticipated New Voices in Musical Theatre Musical theatre is still something that is adapting over time, and a few decades ago musical theatre songs had this level of mainstream popularity where they were played on the radio. Things like the Evita cast recording and the Jesus Christ Superstar cast recording gained traction and are known by a previous generation because they were played on the radio. We don't really have as many musical theatre songs that have that same kind of popularity. So what we've been needing for a long time are songwriters in musical theatre who can combine musical theatre kind of a sound with contemporary pop. And that's something that Marlo and Moss definitely proved they could do with six. But they could they do it again. All of this and more will be discussed in today's video. If you enjoy this one and you want to hear more of what I have to say about other shows and you want to stay up to date with all things Broadway and the West End, make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel. And if you want to see these videos before anybody else, click on the link in the description. Sign up to become one of my channel members where all of my videos get an early preview. Now let's talk about why Am I so Single? The new musical from the writers of six so let me give you a little bit of context here. If you're not too sure what this run actually is. This is a public ticketed workshop. A workshop is something that most shows go through where they have this developmental phase and the cast come in and rehearse the material. The material is often adapted and rewritten during this process. At the end of a workshop there will usually be a presentation presentation. But the process of doing the workshop and rehearsing is just as instructive as that final performance. That performance can be for the creative team themselves, it can be for investors, it can be for producers, it could be for programmers, that is to say, people who might give them money or people who might give them a stage to put the show on. And yes, there were people like that in attendance this evening. Often these events are private. I've been invited to a few before in some cases to give a little bit of informal feedback. As someone who gets to see a lot of musicals and in known for having a lot of opinions about them. But there are other shows that have also taken the workshop format and done something a little bit more public with it. We're seeing a handful of new musicals that are trying to refine their material and build an audience at the same time by doing these sort of semi Staged workshop presentations, shows like Halls and Operation Mincemeat have even had developmental runs where they have made it very clear to ticket buyers that that what they're seeing is an evolving version of the show that is going to keep changing from one night to the next. But those were a lot more staged than this show was. So the why Am I so Single workshop is having a few performances at the Lillian Bayless Studio, which is part of Sadler's Wells. This particular workshop is being co produced by Kenny Wax, who is not only the producer of Six, but also of all of your favourite Mischief Theatre shows like the Play that Goes Wrong. He's joined on the producing team by George Styles, who as well as being a producer, is also a beloved music musical theatre composer who lent his writing skills to the stage versions of Mary Poppins and Betty Blue Eyes and Just so. And finally, Amina Hamid, one of the youngest and most exciting producers working right now in the West End. And this already is a fantastic team of people to be behind this project because it does still have a very young sensibility. I like that we have young, new, intrepid producers involved in this. I think that's important because of the nature of this show. But also, also 6 has become such a huge international success and I think it's great that the producers of Six would want to be involved with Marlo and Moss next project. It shows the belief that they have in them as artists and I think that's lovely. So I've said the word workshop so many times at this point, Drink every time I say the word workshop. But what this actually is is it's a bare stage. It in this instance happens to be fully staged and there were no scripts in hand and, and we had sort of some of the tech elements. We had a band at the back. It was a five, four, four piece band. The performers were mic'd, we had a couple of leads, some slightly supporting characters and then most of what became just an ensemble. They were fully dancing, there was full choreography and there were set pieces that came in and out, but no staging as such. They were costumed in a way that was clear but not particularly elaborate. But it didn't come as much of a surprise for a workshop presentation that the whole thing looked not unlike rehearsal space. There was one lighting state throughout the entire thing. And so if you've booked tickets to this and you're wondering what to expect in terms of the level of like visuals, that's what you're getting now. As well as being co written by Toby Marlowe, and Lucy Moss. Lucy Moss is also directing this show, much as she co directed six and directed Legally Blonde at the Regent's Park Open Air Theatre a few summers back and she directed the Ratatoozical. Hello. I remember that the other big creative attached to this production was the choreographer Ellen Kane, whose work went viral in the hit movie musical Matilda. I have the cast information here as well. So Christina Bennington and Joe Foster were starring. Christina, you might know from the 2nd Theatre Royal Haymarket run of Heather's where she played Veronica. She was the original Raven in the West End's Bat out of Hell. Unbelievably, she hasn't been in six yet. She's so talented so that is definitely overdue. Opposite her was Jo Foster who is a fantastic non binary performer. Jo was seen in in the Regent's park revival of Legally Blonde and was then fantastic in the role of May in and Juliet at the Shaftesbury Theatre as part of the closing cast. They were joined by Millie O'Connell and Noah Thomas, who played slightly smaller featured roles and also performed among the ensemble which included Jemima Brown, Josh Butler, D'Angelo Jones, Tilly LaBelle, Yengo, Owen McHugh, Caitlin Redpath, Rhys Wilkinson and Charlotte Wilmot. So those have been all of the details about the workshop presentation of this show and that's a lot of what we knew already going into it. Let me tell you what I found out this evening. What is this show about? So we quickly come to realize that why Am I so Single? Is a deeply self reverential musical about two musical theatre writers who are also best friends who are trying to write their next show while contending with their challenging romantic lives. The whole thing takes place in just one location which is one of the characters, Flats, although we conceive of and sort of musicalize other locations around that. It takes place over one particularly wine filled evening because the character of Nancy has just been upsettingly dumped by a guy that she was planning to stop seeing anyway. And so she goes to meet her friend Oliver to commiserate and uplift each other, drink a lot of wine and try and start writing their next musical while asking each other the question why am I so single? This being at the very least a loosely autobiographical musical, it references a lot of real people, all of whom, including the main characters, use pseudonyms to protect their identities, which are taken from the musical Oliver. We have Oliver and Nancy and a bunch of other recognizable character names. In fact, there are musical theater references aplenty. We have a nod to Les Mis, we have nods to Wicked and Chicago and the musical Oliver, which actually gets referenced a lot and becomes quite a serious plot point in this thing. Now, for the most part, these two are the only real characters. And what I've described to you is basically the plot of the show, which may sound a little bit narrow in terms of its scope, which it's worth pointing out, is also something that Six has had a little bit of criticism about before in terms of feeling a little bit more like a concert than a full book musical and being a little bit on the shorter side. And you might have to see it to believe it, but somehow the plot I've just described to you does actually fill a two act structure. The first act is an hour and 20 minutes. We had a 15 minute interval and then the second act was 50 minutes long. And there are about 12 songs. And without telling you too much of the plot because I think it's still too early in this musical's life for me to give away all of the plot revelations in specific detail, I'm gonna run through the songs and what they're like. So we start with a song called why Am I so Single? This is jazzy. It already has a very different feel to Six. Six does a great job of emulating pop music, but certainly one of my biggest intrigues going into this would be how much they are able to utilize a musical theatre sound and something more traditionally theatrical alongside that. And already with this opening number that's quite clearly established, there's then a great sort of a pattersong about recently cancelled dates. Dates that got cancelled before they could ever happen. There's then a number that has a little bit more of an R and B influence maybe. It's got a great hook. It's called See youe Never. They do a little bit of like contemporary tap in there, but tap that feels very modern and urban. Then there's a wonderful song about Ross and Rachel from Friends. It's a whole thing. If you have any kind of nostalgia attached to the final season of Friends, you're absolutely going to love this moment and you're going to be right there emotionally on board with it. Following that, we have a brief reprise of the song why Am I so Single? And then a great number about a meat market which parodies a beloved musical theater song. I'm not going to tell you. Which you will have to wait and find out for yourselves. And this is probably the closest thing to feeling like a House of Holbein moment within this show. It's a little bit Ludicrous. Afterwards, Joe Foster's character, Oliver, sings a more traditional kind of like an Old School Musical Theatre Broadway pastiche kind of a number, which is very tongue in cheek in terms of its lyrics. Then it's Christina Bennington's turn to sing a huge high belt y solo. If you know anything about her as a performer, you know that vocally she is audacious and terrific. The hook that keeps coming around in this chorus is, I would abandon it all. This is going to be a very popular song. I think a lot of people are going to perform this. This is going to be audition rep. I dare say I had started to realize a lot of the songs in this score were giving me the feel of early 2000s pop. The start of this felt very much like the song Breakaway. I spread my wings and I learned how to fly. But it's also functionally within the structure. It's a little bit of a Heart of Stone moment. It's very much the most profound ballad up until that point in the show. Finally, the first act ends with something a little bit more traditionally musical theatre that's also a little bit operatic and dramatic and epic. Maybe it's familiar of Les Mis and the way it's been staged. I'm not going to tell you the conceit because it's very funny and I don't want to spoil it. But it's an ingenious and bizarre way of ending the first act, I will say. Entering the second act, they really dial up the early 2000s sound with a throwback to their university experience and A Night Out. There is then a sort of a sweet acoustic duet shared between our two protagonists. After which is a song that I assume is called Disco Ball. It will be known as the Disco Ball Song. It reminds me a little bit theatrically in terms of what it does and its structure and the way it just sort of opens itself. It reminds me a little bit of all youl Wanna do from Six. If you know how that is performed within the context of the show. That'll give you a little bit of insight as to what this number is like. And after that, we get a couple of reprises and we start to go into a finale sequence. The details of which I'm not going to share with you because, again, far too early in the life of this show. But in terms of what it depicts, it really is what I've already told you. The two of them are going back and forth, trying to overanalyze why it is that they are single, why it is that they don't go on more dates, they go on too many dates. What is it about them as people that's informing the decisions they make and informing the way that they respond to romantic propositions, etc. And so we get numbers that are about their identities. We get numbers based around different dating scenarios. It's all hugely theatricalized. And Much like with 6, there is a creeping honesty that slowly begins to unveil itself. Six is like this big parcel that gets unwrapped and then has a little bit of a twist of being a knowing and self referential right at the end. This, without giving too much away, feels like a pass the parcel with just one more layer than six does. It feels like it nods at the twist in six, but it has more surprises in store thereafter. I will say, all of which is vague and ambiguous enough that I'm hoping I'm not really spoiling anything here. But also this is being performed publicly right now to a paying audience. So it is out there to give you some more of a sense of the vibe of this show. They speak extensively to the audience. Like I said, it's deeply self reverential. We have a whole spoken voiceover narrator introduction to the whole thing where someone is pretending to introduce it as Sir Ian McKellen. They constantly talk about the production that they are writing at this point and they make reference to the theater it will end up being in. So they were making a lot of jokes at the expense of the Lillian Bayless Studio. This would conceivably be tailored and updated to whatever theater the show happened to be playing in. There is a huge amount of comedy. It feels very current and very contemporary, but it doesn't feel specifically Gen Z. Like I said, we're referencing friends, we're referencing early 2000s things here. It feels more like my sort of an age range. I am in my late twenties actually. It's after midnight on my birthday. So I have turned 28 today. But the way that these characters are written, the way that they speak is also going to feel very applicable to a Gen Z audience, I think. And it has themes that, and I say this often in a lot of shows say this about themselves, but it really does have themes that transcend those generational specificities because it's a show about people who are frustrated that they're perpetually single. And a lot of people can relate to that. So without reviewing, let me tell you a little bit about why seeing the show this evening has made me so excited. So it's fair to say going into this. And my friends will tell you, I did not think we were guaranteed another hit. I was deeply curious about what this was going to be. But there were a lot of people who, when they saw new musical by Toby Marlowe and Lucy Moss. This is going to be fantastic because Six was so great and Six is great. But Six is so specific. And like I said, the scope of it is a little bit limited. The music is very much in the pop sphere. It's not the most theatrical show in the world. I do think it is more than just a concert. I think that the people who say that 6 is just a concert, not really a musical, aren't really fully understanding its potency and its theatrical power. But certainly I was hoping that whatever it is that they would write next would have a little bit more depth to it, would be a little bit more sophisticated, would be a little bit more theatrical in its storytelling, in its structure, in its scope, in its score. And this, I think, delivers on all of those fronts. But it still feels very much like it's been written by the same team. I was saying to Aaron as we were coming back from the theatre this evening, there are a lot of musical theatre composers who have a sound that is consistent across all of their scores, but there are also composers that have a vibe and a sensibility that's consistent across all of their shows. Someone like Stephen Sondheim, even though he's worked with a host of different book writers, you can tell the feel of a Sondheim show, you can tell the feel of a Rodgers and Hammerstein show. And now based on these, you can see the link and you can very much tell the feel of a Marlowe and Moss musical. It feels very unique, very contemporary, very much like we are pushing the genre of musical theatre. It touches on some of the same ideas of something like a strange loop, but without being quite as lofty. I like that it's self referential and clever, without feeling pretentious or obnoxious. It's still very down to earth. It's still very relatable, much like 6 is. I will say I'm already feeling like this show is going to be a lot harder to market. And they've given interviews and they've talked about Six being born out of them. Trying to come up with the most marketable idea for the Edinburgh Fringe, because it was a student show at the time and they were thinking, what will people buy tickets to go and see? They did such a great job of that. They created one of the most marketable musicals in History. This is going to be a harder cell. So this show undoubtedly feels a little bit more sophisticated, has a little bit more depth than six does, but it also feels like they haven't taken the biggest step away from six. It feels like one step in a direction towards fuller, structured two act book musicals, towards something a little bit more sophisticated, but while retaining a lot of what made 6 so refreshing. And there's such a clarity of identity shared by these pieces, you can absolutely now discern what it is that Marlo and Moss will bring to a musical. And as well as just producing these scores full of absolute bangers, for them to be able to establish that in their work so early on, I think is incredibly impressive, when all they really need to be doing at this stage of the game is just writing good shows. For them to be asserting their own voice with such clarity and for it to be such a fresh and new voice that in so many ways is a shining light right now in the world of musical theatre, that's just so exciting. Needless to say, a lot of people will be seeing this workshop in the next few days. A lot of fans, a lot of pundits, a lot of industry figures, a lot of potentially interested parties, and there has certainly been a huge amount of curiosity about what this show might look like and what the next show from the writers of Six was going to be. I'm very excited about what it is that they've produced. I think the fans are going to be very excited about what it is that they've produced. It allows for two performers to give really strong performances. That's something we've already seen in this workshop presentation. That's not really what it's about at this stage, but my gosh, do Christina Bennington and Joe Foster give fantastic performances? Like I'd mentioned before, it might be a bit of a tricky one to market, but what we're seeing at this stage does feel like a pretty polished product. There are things that can be tinkered with and there are storytelling points that could be ironed out just a little bit. But I wouldn't be surprised if we're seeing a fuller version of this show before too long. And as soon as I hear any rumors about that, I will be sure to let you know right here on my channel. So if you want to make sure you're one of the first people to hear when we're getting a full production of the musical, why am I so Single? Make sure you're subscribed. In the meantime. That is all that I can tell you, I think at this stage about this show, but it is definitely very exciting. If you're going to see this workshop presentation or if you've already been to see it, comment with your thoughts down below. Especially if you are not a member of the industry or a critic and you're allowed to say whatever you want, feel free to let people know what you thought about this workshop presentation. Thank you so much for watching today's video. I hope you've enjoyed. If you did, make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel for many more videos like this coming very soon. I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day. For 10 more seconds, I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a stagey day. Subscribe.