There’s a pleasing predictability to musical biopics: working class boys done good, corrupted by the money men and the sex and drugs (as well as bitter rivalries with each other) until they see the light and start making music for music’s sake again has a connect-the-dots simplicity that makes for fantastic West End fodder. But then again, the jukebox musical has a similarly predictable pattern: crackling opening number followed by complicated middle pieces, a torch-song post-interval and some quiet pieces leading up to a final showstopper. What’s most surprising here is that two of theatre’s enfant terribles, Ed Hall and Joe Penhall, have conspired to make the latest of these, the Kinks musical Sunny Afternoon, which just opened in the West End after a successful run at the Hampstead Theatre, something quite so formulaic.
John Dagliesh and George Maguire in Sunny Afternoon
Not that a musical about the Kinks is a bad idea – far from it, they’re a band fully deserving of a bit more kudos. If anything, Sunny Afternoon does the job in reminding you of the number of classic songs the Kinks are responsible for, from the early growl of the opening chord of You Really Got Me through the benign warmth of Waterloo Sunset to the confident sexual ambivalence anthem Lola. But these are the rare examples of tracks that really stick with you – my overriding memory of the night is of recognising a song from a chord or a lyric and the promptly forgetting it again. A couple of songs aside, maybe the Kinks really were the 60s version of Suede – cutting edge at the time, all but forgotten painfully quickly.
However, when it goes, it really goes – what Joe Penhall and Ed Hall (with the help of Kinks frontman Ray Davies) have achieved may be a colour-by-numbers West End musical biopic, but the fact that their cast can actually sing and play their instruments (with the help of a backing band, but still…) goes a long way in establishing their credibility. Moments such as an a capella number in the middle and the band playing their way into Waterloo Sunset are beautiful and a testament to leads John Dagliesh as Ray Davies and George Maguire as David Davies, who create a beautiful tempestuous bond that feels intensely believable. The remaining ensemble all have their moments, although Ed Hall’s preoccupation with boys waving contracts in each other’s faces and his inability to direct women are becoming trademarks he should be trying harder to avoid.
John Dagliesh in Sunny Afternoon
But most of the problems here, unfortunately, can be laid slap-bang at Penhall’s feet. His script is boring, moving us from biopic through West End cliche with ponderous inevitability. I’m not sure I buy that this particular slice of the Kinks’ story is the best choice for dramatisation, nor do his song choices follow the correct chronology, but the biggest crime here is shoehorning so anarchic a group into so trite a structure. It’s like someone has told him where songs have to go – for example, the second act opens with a torch song that couldn’t feel more obviously placed and less relevant, just to give the token woman who isn’t the mother another moment to do something before disappearing. I’m not a particular proponent of the Bechdel test, but this goes beyond embarrassing failure into the realms of grim example of what happens when women are given unpleasantly short shrift.
It’s not quite as jukebox as Let It Be was or Thriller still is, but I can’t quite shake the feeling that it might have been better that it had been. Instead, this transfer from the Hampstead is trying it’s damndest to be the cool kid on the West End block, with some of the best music and team available, but the result is not at the level it should be. It’s not a disaster, but more was (quite rightly) expected.
Ned Derrington, John Dagliesh, Adam Sopp and George Maguire in Sunny Afternoon
Grubby Strugglers 