THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE (Southwark Playhouse/Stream Theatre)***

 

By Cal

Link: https://www.stream.theatre/season/25

Available until: Livestreams Monday-Saturday at 7pm, with matinées on Tuesday, Saturday and Sunday at 2.30. Final performance Sunday 14^th March.

Stream Theatre has come such a long way since its first weeks of concerts in the London Coliseum. They’ve progressed from streaming concerts to full-scale musicals and plays and it’s a great opportunity to see shows that are completely new, whether it’s a show that (unless I missed it) hasn’t made it to the UK yet, hasn’t been performed in the UK for a long time or is a very new musical.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a very new musical and it’s a lot of fun. It’s supposed to be family-friendly and although I think the young children I watched it with struggled with the complexities of the plot, I think director Charlotte Westenra has really focused on putting in moments for kids to enjoy there are lots of great moments which my younger siblings loved. There was also one moment in particular which they wanted to re-enact and they were rather disappointed to realise we only have one broom (though I don’t really want to think about what they’d need to do to the brooms in order to recreate what we saw on the stage!)

The broom scene was brilliant, though, and very original. Original moments are something The Sorcerer’s Apprentice doesn’t seem to have very much of but when you’re trying to create a family show, you do sometimes have to let the originality go and use the tried and tested methods which always go down well with children.

The story has a lot about family relationships and is particularly focused on Johan Gottel, the sorcerer, and his daughter Eva. Eva has powers of her own and wants to develop them, but Johan is being a typical overprotective father. As Eva is a typical rebellious teen, things don’t always go terribly well. Johan’s powers come from the Aurora Borealis, but an idiot called Fabian decides to use the power for himself, which not only puts everyone in danger, it’s also bad for the environment.

Richard Hough wrote the book for the musical and he introduces his various characters really well. It’s great to see a feisty female and a rather nervous male. This is different from what we’re used to seeing (though there are quite a lot of feisty females around now) and it’s also very important to show everyone that males and females don’t have to display specific characteristics (not that everyone even needs to be male or female) and that it’s perfectly all right. Girls need to see they can take the lead if they want to and boys need to see they don’t have to be action heroes in order to be valued and loved.

The way the story handles environmental problems is also very clever. You can learn a lot from watching this play, but you never feel like you’re being lectured or reproached. It all feels like part of the story and the information is revealed in ways which are interesting, as well as appropriate for the character who is speaking. 

Ben Morales Frost has written the music and although there are no true stand-out songs, it has a bit of everything, including drama, comedy and romance. (Is it just me who was shocked by the kiss? I’m sure they’re bubbled and regularly tested, but it’s not something I’d expect to see from something that was filmed during the pandemic. I hope everyone stayed safe - I think the show was filmed as live rather than being literally streamed live so it’s not like it’s every night for a fortnight.)

David Thaxton plays Johan and strongly brings out the different sides of him, the father who thinks he knows best and the sorcerer who isn’t sure what to do. Mary Moore, a recent drama school graduate, is very likeable in her professional debut as Eva. She has great comic timing, lots of charisma and a lovely voice. For now, she might be spending a lot of time playing teen roles (and there are a lot of great teen roles she could play), but she definitely has talent.

Yazdan Qafouri is very endearing in the role of Erik. He’s not the most typical male (apart from making a big fuss when he’s ill), but Yazdan shows that being quiet and physically vulnerable doesn’t stop him from being both lovely and useful.  Marc Pickering’s Fabian is an interesting and hilarious villain, Nicola Blackman is excellent as Isobel Grammaticus and Dawn Hope’s Lamia has a very powerful presence.

There are probably things that can be done to make the script a bit more accessible for children, but even as it is, it’s an enjoyable musical with some great characters, great songs and some very promising young performers.