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You always remember your past love. And Edna loves Harry. Besides Harry is the cheeky Northern member of a British boyband, a good-looking void who has a propensity for flicking his pretty hair, and Edna is a 14-year-old schoolgirl who, within the phrases of her pal, writes “psycho fan fiction” and posts it on the web. That is Fangirls, a brand new musical in regards to the euphoria and distress of being a teenage woman with an obsession. Aptly, then, it’s the type of present that evokes outsized emotions and ardent devotion. Within the phrases of the fangirls, it left me “truly useless”.
Earlier than opening in London, Fangirls premiered in Australia to five-star opinions, the place it acquired its personal set of followers who queued across the block for tickets. Author Yve Blake, prompted by the worldwide devastation wrought by Zayn leaving One Course in 2015, felt compelled to jot down a present exploring who fangirls actually are beneath the derisory thought of them as hysterical, foolish and screechy. The end result combines the acid wit of Six, the insurgent streak of Matilda and the gooey coronary heart of Everyone’s Speaking About Jamie with a view to create a musical that feels in contrast to anything.
Its trick is to be a lot cleverer than you assume it’s (a bit like these fangirls themselves). Edna’s infatuation is advanced. Sure, she has an image of Harry on her pillow and spends an excessive amount of time on-line pondering up fantasies the place she and the star of fictional supergroup Heartbreak Nation run away collectively. However she’s truly anxious that Harry has “despair eyes” and must be saved from the band. That is a web based neighborhood the place conspiracy theories proliferate – are queer relationships between band members being lined up? – dressed up within the guise of courageous truth-telling and wanting happiness for his or her heroes.
The poignancy is in Edna’s clearly – however not that clear to her – parallel emotions of being misplaced and alone. Acutely painful to her is the truth that “just one individual understands me… and he doesn’t know who I’m”. Worse nonetheless is when her frenemy, Jules, discovers her fanfic weblog and reads it out in school. Might it worsen? It does. When Heartbreak Nation lastly announce tour dates in Sydney, the extortionate costs don’t match as much as a schoolgirl’s pocket cash. It’s all so unfair!
However alongside all of it is a raucous comedy that completely captures the hyperbole and bluntness of web parlance. “You smash my life and also you make my day,” goes one lyric. “Use my guts as your spaghetti,” goes one other. A video circulates of a woman being introduced on stage and hugged by Harry – why does she get to go up there? “She’s terminally in poor health,” factors out Edna’s buddy Brianna. And Fangirls is usually disarmingly darkish because the traces between fan fiction and actuality start to blur, as being “truly useless” threatens to tackle one other that means. If the second act doesn’t fairly attain the heights of the primary, it nonetheless manages to complete on a giddy, glitter-filled rush of brilliantly OTT satisfaction.
It have to be enjoyable to carry out in a present this joyful and good, and the solid are pure pleasure. Mary Malone uncovers an opportunity for comedy in nearly all of queen bee Jules’s traces, Debbie Kurup is shifting as Edna’s put-upon, anxious mum, and Thomas Grant finds simply the precise stage of pastiche in his preening Harry. However as Edna, Jasmine Elcock, who has solely not too long ago graduated, made me fangirl, uniting a knockout voice with a efficiency that manages to be relatable and absurd all of sudden. She’s the actual hero we’re rooting for.
All the weather come collectively in Paige Rattray’s manufacturing to make Fangirls usually really feel like an actual live performance; it’s the primary theatre present the place I’ve ever been requested to wave my cellphone gentle within the air. And though Blake succinctly targets the cynical capitalist exploitation of teenage ladies, this celebration of vulnerability, bravery and self-acceptance will win you over for one thing extra. Fangirls doesn’t simply evoke the untamed internal lifetime of being a teen, it reclaims it – making you wistful for if you felt issues so deeply that they really harm.
‘Fangirls’ at Lyric Hammersmith till 24 August
