How the world has changed from a generation ago. For a group of schoolboys to meet these days, it might well involve a WhatsApp group or some other messaging and video calling app, with up-to-the-minute updates on who was where and who was still coming and who has been held up. For this group of mid-1980s schoolboys, however, they had to, as readers of a certain age will have had to, pre-arrange a time and place to meet up. Whoever was there was there and whoever wasn’t, well, wasn’t. There are added complications in this narrative: the Republic of Ireland at the time was suffering from what some people called ‘brain drain’. As a brief prologue makes clear, as far as the younger generation was concerned, there was little prospect of earning a decent salary in Ireland at the time, so the best thing to do was go somewhere else. It’s hardly a spoiler, then, that this ends up being what a couple of characters do.
It throws a spanner in the works of the storyline, however, given that Conor (an engaging and hugely likeable Sheridan Townsley) has made some sort of pact with school friend and fellow band member Eamon (Jesse Nyakudya) that their songwriting and composition partnership would ‘never’ break down. Then again, it’s the sort of eternal promise people make in the prime of their youth. Those who went across the Irish Sea, or even across the Atlantic Ocean, seldom returned, at least not permanently, and it is within this context that the urge for youngsters to run away from it all was more dominant than it probably was elsewhere in the industrialised world.
That this is a musical is mostly, if not entirely, down to Conor attempting to impress Raphina (Grace Collender), who has her reasons for hanging out in a telephone booth (remember those?). Conor pulls, or thinks he does, but it transpires things are a bit more complicated with Raphina than that. (A musical with a love triangle? Shock horror!) The result of an initial conversation is that he needs to start a band, at once, because Raphina has been hired, as much as a schoolboy can ‘hire’ someone, to be in a music video – they were all the rage at the time.
At their first rehearsal, the production itself suffers (for want of a better word) in the same way that musicals like Sister Act do, where a group of novices (pardon the pun) can sing very well already – before, as the storyline would have it, they learn to sing very well. Here, there is no difference in the standard of singing and musicianship at the start of the show than at the end, so the audience does not see an ‘improvement’ in their output over time. Conscious that I might be clutching at straws, there is much to enjoy in this gritting and heartwarming show. Gareth Owen’s sound design ensures a decent balance between the band and the singing, such that the lyrics are crystal clear.
A subplot involving Conor’s experiences, as well as those of other schoolboys, at the local Christian Brothers school, elicited audible gasps from an unassuming audience at the performance I attended. The production wisely avoids on stage re-enactments of the very worst behaviours exhibited by school leaders, or even referring to them. This is not, in the show’s defence, an attempt at a cover-up, but rather to maintain the focus on what becomes a love story, and the cathartic release made possible to these schoolboys through writing and performing music.
The homophobia, mind you, at least by contemporary standards, is off the scale, though it was in line with prevailing attitudes in school playgrounds – and elsewhere – at the time. It’s one of those shows where even the bad guy is singing along by the end. To slightly misquote Operation Mincemeat, this isn’t half-arsed, it’s full-arsed. A slight pity, then, that the programme doesn’t tell us who played what instruments – some are multi-instrumentalists, as the best of actor-musician casts tend to be. A lively, feel-good coming-of-age show that captures the vibrancy and energy of youth with excellence.
Review by Chris Omaweng
It’s Dublin, 1985, and sixteen-year-old Conor can’t catch a break. His parents are fighting, his brother won’t leave the house and he’s not fitting in at his new Catholic school.
Enter Raphina, a mysterious girl who’s too cool for school and on the lookout for a modelling job. In an effort to impress, Conor hires her to star in a music video for his band. Only problem is he doesn’t have a band. Yet.
CAST (in alphabetical order)
Tateyana Arutura – Anne
Grace Collender – Raphina
Harry Curley – Larry / Dance Captain
Jenny Fitzpatrick – Sandra
Indiana Hawkes – Gary
Cameron Hogan – Darren
Adam Hunter – Brendan
Lloyd Hutchinson – Brother Baxter
Lucianna McEvoy – Penny
Jesse Nyakudya – Eamon
Lochlann Ó Mearáin – Robert
Matthew Philp – Declan
Sheridan Townsley – Conor
CREATIVES
Book – Enda Walsh
Music and Lyrics – Gary Clark and John Carney
Director – Rebeca Taichman
Choreographer – Sonya Tayeh
Set Design – Bob Crowley
Lighting Design – Natasha Katz
Music Supervision – Peter Gordeno
Sound Design – Gareth Owen
Video Design – Luke Halls
Costume Design – Lisa Zinni
Wigs, Hair and Make-Up Design – Helen Keane
Musical Direction – Nick J Barstow
Voice and Dialect Coach – Hazel Holder
Fight and Intimacy Director – Dani Mac
SING STREET
Lyric Hammersmith Theatre
8 July to 23 August 2025
