Ruth Ellis remains notorious not just for murdering her lover, but for the grim distinction of becoming the last woman hanged in the UK in May 1955. Her story has long been a cause célèbre, spawning books, stage plays, documentaries, TV dramas and even the film Dance With A Stranger. Evidently, someone decided what this well-mined tragedy lacked was a musical. Enter Ruth, the musical, at Wilton’s Music Hall.
The framing device places us in Ellis’s cell during the twenty-four hours before her execution. A shadowy male figure lurks behind her as she recounts her life; she assumes he’s a reporter or prison official, blissfully unaware he is Albert Pierrepoint, the hangman. We then lurch through flashbacks: an abusive childhood, the fictional Hollywood Club where she works as a hostess, meets racing driver David Blakely and the lead-up to his murder. Scenes shuttle between cell, nightclub and adolescence, eventually stumbling into a courtroom where lawyers argue with each other and a judge inexplicably wields a gavel – apparently imported from a different legal system altogether.
Which raises the question: Does the world need a musical about Ruth Ellis? Possibly. Is this it? Emphatically not. At times, it feels as though someone has unearthed a time capsule containing a forgotten cache of 1960s songs and, rather than leaving them buried, decided to put them in a musical. The songs are largely monotonous – dreary in tone, indistinguishable in tempo – and drain any sense of urgency from the narrative. In an era that has produced the likes of Hamilton, Rent and Assassins, this feels not so much retro as embalmed.
The problems don’t end there. The dialogue is clunky, the lyrics clichéd, the direction is leaden, and the pacing – both musical and dramatic – hovers somewhere near the funereal. The eleven-strong cast gamely do what they can, but most of the characters remain stubbornly two-dimensional. This isn’t the case with stand-out Ian Puleston-Davies, who lends some welcome gravitas as Pierrepoint, while Hannah Traylen and Bibi Simpson bring flickers of life to Past and Cell Ruth respectively. Elsewhere, emotional beats are bafflingly mishandled: when Ruth is told by Blakely that her best friend has died in a car crash, she barely reacts, leaving one to wonder why the moment exists at all.
There are, admittedly, a few redeeming touches. Nicolai Hart-Hansen’s costumes are on-point, David Howe’s lighting gives Ruth’s cell a suitably oppressive air, and the six-piece band, under Dustin Conrad, provides the evening’s most consistent quality. Beyond that, one is left puzzling over oddities such as a Fred Astaire-esque dancer in a top hat and tails who appears as a shadow briefly projected on the wall at the rear of the stage; it achieves nothing and vanishes without explanation.
Ultimately, Ruth is a frustratingly inert retelling of a truly compelling story about class, abuse, jealousy and the death penalty. With two directors, three composers, and two lyricists, the production proves that too many cooks don’t just spoil the broth— they drain it of flavour entirely. You can often gauge the success of a show by the reaction from the first night audience, where the theatre is full of family and friends – you’d even expect some overreaction, but last night the applause at the final curtain was tepid to say the least – maybe they were just disappointed like me?
Review by Alan Fitter
Love. Death. Obsession.
The Ruth Ellis story had them all.
In 1955, Ruth Ellis became the last woman to be executed in Britain. A glamorous nightclub hostess. A violent, upper-class lover. A series of gunshots that shocked the nation. Tried, condemned and hanged at Holloway Prison, her fate was sealed by a society quick to judge and slow to listen.
Now her story is retold with urgency and fire.
RUTH is a bold British noir musical that delves into sex, class, power and injustice in 1950s Britain. In the era of #MeToo, Ellis’s story of abuse, control and patriarchal judgment feels chillingly contemporary—less a historical scandal than a modern reckoning.
Cast
Garth Bardsley, Paddy Duff, John Faal, Sarah Lawn, Connor Payne, Alice Redmond, Bibi Simpson, Hannah Traylen, Freddy Williams, Mei-Li Yap, Ian Puleston-Davies
Music by John Cameron, Francis Rockliff & James Reader
Lyrics by Caroline Slocock & John Cameron
Book by Caroline Slocock
Directed by Andy Morahan & Denise Silvey
Design by Nicolai Hart-Hansen
Lighting Design by David Howe
Sound Design by Simon Slater
Choreographer and Intimacy Director Rebecca Wield
Music arranged and supervised by John Cameron
Musical Director Dustin Conrad
Produced by Denise Silvey, Caroline Slocock & Andy Morahan
RUTH
Wilton’s Music Hall
18 to 28 March 2026
