Spend, Spend, Spend!
Spend, Spend, Spend!
Music by Steve Brown
Book and Lyrics by Steve Brown and Justin Greene
The Watermill Theatre
The Lowry, 12 October 2010
A joyous and energetic musical inspired by the life of Viv Nicholson, pools winner par excellence.
Viv vowed that she would spend all her winnings, and so she did. One could read her story (this musical) as a parable about the dangers of consumerism or an illustration of the disinclination of the working classes (that’s you and me, mate) to defer pleasure. But that would be wrong.
Nah, it is about a woman’s desire to seize the day and burn the candle at both ends, to quote Saint Edna’s famous line. Viv wanted above all to live, live, live! And so she did.
Karen Mann and Kirsty Hoiles gave sterling performances as Viv in her present and younger guises, while Tara Nelson caught the eye (or my eye, at any rate), especially in the sequence inspired (seemingly) by Some Like it Hot. Tony Curtis must be smiling down somewhere, an arm around Jack Lemmon’s shoulder.
Spend, Spend, Spend! is a musical that is as vital and vibrant as its subject. It is touring throughout the UK at the minute. The tour dates are here.
Explore posts in the same categories: Musical review, Theatre reviewTags: Justin Greene, Karen Mann, Kirsty Hoiles, Spend Spend Spend, Steve Brown, Viv Nicholson
You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.
