Much like my Oscar analysis, I'm going to preface my issues with this year's Musical Theatre Matters nominations by saying I sadly did not manage to see many of the musicals on offer at the Fringe this year, certainly nowhere near as many as I'd like to have done. However, I did see A-Team, Princess Cabaret, Baby, Showstopper (8 times), Jerry Springer the Opera, Honk, Merrily We Roll Along, Porn, Gingers, and Facebook,as well as hearing the casts of or excerpts from Over the Threshold, Have A Nice Life, 6 Ways, and Barbershopera.
This is my third successive year at the Fringe, though my first as a performer and not purely a punter. I have seen a lot of good and a lot of bad since I first started seeing shows as a child, but this year, I saw hands down the two worst shows I have ever seen anywhere ever, Fringe or no. A-Team the Musical was one of these shows. I not only do not have words to describe how terrible it was, I'm pretty sure those words have yet to be invented, and will only be said once, right before causing the sudden and catastrophic apocalypse at the end of the world. So the fact that A-Team the Musical has been nominated for Best Book for a New Musical is so far beyond my comprehension that it actually makes Slumdog's Oscar victory seem sensible.
A-Team the Musical was so bad that, in a one hour show, I fell asleep twice, laughed precisely once, and toyed with the idea of leaving every 5 minutes. I only decided against it because I did not want to abandon my equally bored and horrified friend to suffer alone - no doubt he would have walked out too, but he was reviewing it. And yes, he gave it a much deserved one star, though he was tempted by refusing them even that. By contrast, Baby's and Facebook's books were outstanding, though they were by no means the only two of the shows I saw which managed to put together at least a vaguely entertaining or amusing story, something A-Team entirely failed to do.
The second bone I have to pick is with the nomination of Porn the Musical in the Best New Musical category. Now Porn is not the self-indulgent and painful extraction of one's goodwill towards musicals that A-Team is, but it was seriously underwhelming, an almost total disappointment. The music was generally poor (bar the one PHD song), the comedy hackneyed and clumsy and the show just fundamentally crap and predictable - the band, though extremely tight, sounded like a glorified midi keyboard, especially with the twee, synth-heavy arrangements they chose.
The whole show must come under the label of a missed opportunity - they chose to tell a story that coincided with the world of porn, rather than actually engaging with and satirising porn itself, either in the book, the music or the lyrics. The same is partially true of Facebook, but at least their story is engaging. Saying Porn is a contender for the best New Musical is akin to saying drinking your own urine is good for you - even if there's no other option, there's still something fundamentally wrong with it. The logical conclusion would be that there were just a load of shit musicals this year, but I know for a fact that is not the case. I saw Showstopper 8 times, and even on its worst night, it was twice the musical Porn ever was (and 100 times the musical A-Team was).
From what I saw of their Cabaret performances, Over The Threshold will rightly deserve many of these plaudits. I wish Showstopper all the best in their category, and I hope that, where appropriate, George Square is the victor. Chris Grady and the team deserve as much for their sterling work and effort. But I cannot bring myself to support Porn, and I not only wish A-team the very worst of luck, I wish it had stayed a fanboy's dream.
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