Reality TV and talent shows don’t seem to like theatre very much. On The X Factor, nothing is more likely to make Simon Cowell sneer than a performance that he deems too “musical theatre”. Last autumn, E4’s Stage School, set in a performing arts college, was a reality show that had absolutely no grasp on the reality of theatre training. The programme’s fame-hungry prima donnas seemed to believe that making a career in theatre has nothing to do with talent and hard work and everything to do with pouting and behaving badly.
Such shows reinforce the idea that acting is easy and that talent, training and technique don’t matter. As if anyone can be the next Dame Judi Dench or Maria Friedman. All that’s required is to be spotted on a programme such as Let It Shine, the current BBC1 Saturday-night show conceived by Gary Barlow. It aims to put together a boyband to tour in a new musical written by Tim Firth and Barlow, based on the songs of Take That.
There has already been a musical based on the songs of Take That. It was called Never Forget, and I can recall almost nothing about it. Except the rain. It had rain so intelligent that it could spell “never forget” all on its own right before the interval.
Let It Shine has some good things going for it, including the hugely talented Amber Riley – currently in Dreamgirls at London’s Savoy – as one of the judges. (Although apparently she is about to be replaced on the panel by Lulu, with Graham Norton and Mel Giedroyc following.) It’s much the same as those other shows that gave weeks’ worth of free publicity to forthcoming revivals of The Sound of Music, Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat and Oliver! Perhaps not surprisingly, theatre producer Sonia Friedman is pretty cross, questioning whether the publicly funded BBC should be providing massive amounts of publicity for what will eventually be a commercial touring theatre show.
Details of the stage show itself are still curiously hazy. Have Firth and Barlow actually written this masterpiece yet?
Let It Shine has all the familiar ingredients in the auditions stage, such as the performer who looks physically awkward and nervous but then gives a slay ’em dead performance, leaving the judges acting pop-eyed with amazement. They rise to their feet to applaud with sheer astonishment, as if they cannot believe that singing ability does not automatically go hand in hand with knockout physical beauty.
This is the only acting we get to see. Although the judges keep saying they are looking for performers with charisma and personality, nobody seems at all interested in whether the contestants can act. Indeed, it seems to be a dirty word. “I’m actually an actor,” said one of the contestants, and you could hear the apology in his voice. You would have thought that the basic requirement for those who are going to appear in a touring piece of musical theatre is that they can act and not only belt out a pop tune.
Because that is the prize: not a traditional recording contract, but a chance to tour the UK for a year doing eight shows a week, singing, dancing and acting in Firth and Barlow’s untested musical. That would be a challenge for people who have had three years of rigorous training let alone some of these raw recruits, many of whom are still teenagers. There is a vast difference between being a recording artist and touring in a theatre show, performing night after night and week after week. As Connie Fisher found after winning How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?, long-term touring is exhausting. Technique is crucial to avoid damaging your voice.
Presumably, we will get to know more about this mysterious musical as the series continues. At the moment, the feeling persists that Let It Shine has more of an eye on manufacturing yet another boyband than it does about treating musical theatre with any seriousness.
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