Unbound, performed by the British Youth Music Theatre, was reviewed at the Birmingham Hippodrome.
Star rating: three stars ★ ★ ★ ✩ ✩
The British Youth Music Theatre company celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, looking back on two decades of creating opportunities for young people to explore their love of performing and hopefully set them on a path to having careers in this industry that we love. The charity has had a full slate this year, bringing us seven full productions, starting with Animal Farm back in April followed by All Growed Up earlier this month.
Next up is Unbound, pitched as a “bewitching new musical” from Matthew Harvey, whose name may ring bells having appeared in several West End musicals. Harvey has turned his hand to composing and directing with this teen story of witchcraft and peer pressure, marking his first full-length musical, which played a string of performances recently in the Patrick Studio space at the Birmingham Hippodrome.
The town of Black Lake hides a history of persecution of outsiders, prominently including the death of the mysterious Lucile Fairchild who was killed in a deliberate house fire back in 1782. Two hundred years later, home-schooled teenager Iris has convinced her controlling mother to finally allow her to go to Black Lake High School, where she hopes to finally fit in. Initially distrusted and mocked by her classmates, Iris finds herself on the verge of being accepted following a dare, but her actions unwittingly release the spirit of Lucile Fairchild. Speaking through a mirror, Lucile convinces Iris to set her free, promising to help Iris fit in while inwardly planning her dark revenge, unaware of the power that Iris holds herself.
New original musicals are always worth celebrating so it’s wonderful to see something like Unbound take to the stage, and Harvey certainly gets points for not just adding songs to an existing film from our childhoods. However, it does feel like the piece is heavily inspired by elements from Carrie, Hocus Pocus and The Craft, rather than wholly its original entity, which is a shame as there’s some good potential here.
Harvey has obviously put a lot of time and heart into the project, not only composing the score but also writing the book, and the results show a lot of promise. The tone is a little uneven, the peripheral characters are the standard stock archetypes found in every teen story, and the ending feels rushed and achieved a little too easily. But this is a first attempt at a new title, performed by non-professionals, and seen by the public for the first time, it’s allowed to not be perfect yet. There’s plenty of time and space for the show to grow out of this promising infancy and hopefully evolve into something really rather good.
On its side are three strong female characters in Lucile, Iris and her friend Dani (all played well), a great sense of what’s needed to make an enticing evil witch, and a strong score from Harvey, which mixes 1980s rock with some powerful ballads and fun group numbers to great effect. Director Sarah Jane Schostack also creates some great visuals with the use of projections, mirrors and even cloth backdrops to maintain a sinister spooky mood throughout. Performances are also full of energy and seeing how much these kids want to be on the stage performing in something they love is a fantastic sight, made even better by some happy tears on some of the performers’ faces at the final bows.
Unbound isn’t without its flaws but it’s certainly on the right track. The show’s strength is in its music and its strong female focus, if it can hone the tone of the writing and give the story its own identity rather than highlighting its influences quite so strongly, Harvey could be onto something spell-binding.
Rob Bartley
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