Theatre review: Scissorhandz

Another day, another jukebox musical movie parody transfers from the US to London. And where I thought New York hit Titaníque's confidence in going straight for the West End was warranted, LA export Scissorhandz landing at the more modest Southwark Playhouse was probably also wise: Its underlying theme could not be more relevant to the current darkest timeline, but it's just a shame the creatives who came up with the idea couldn't follow through on its promise. Based, of course, on Tim Burton's 1990 suburban fairytale satire Edward Scissorhands - which has already inspired a Matthew Bourne ballet - Bradley Bredeweg's version ditches the "Edward" part to make Scissorhandz (understudy Lauren Jones) a non-binary humanoid creature, built by The Inventor (Dionne Gipson) out of various spare parts. But their mother dies before replacing the scissors with real hands, and Scissorhandz is left alone in her mansion/lab.

Avon Lady Peg (Emma Williams) decides to try and expand her clientele to the mysterious house at the top of the hill, and finding the orphaned creature there brings them back to stay in her suburban home. A mix of curiosity value and the unusual appendages' skill at topiary and hairdressing makes them a hit in the pastel-coloured suburb and beyond, but when there's a minor crime spree in the neighbourhood, Jim (Richard Carson) finds it easy to point fingers at the outsider and make them a target.

There's definitely a heartfelt and much-needed amplifying of the queer allegories already to be found in Edward Scissorhands here, and the relationship between Scissorhandz and Peg, as well as the more romantic one with her daughter Kim (understudy Grace Towning) have the potential to be very moving. But this is billed as a parody musical and Bredeweg, who also directs, has largely aimed for comedy, a genre which on this evidence is not his forte. In fact, while the publicity has leaned heavily on the show being co-produced by Michelle Visage, it's RuPaul's notoriously... unique sense of humour that comes to mind more.

So the laboured attempts at comedy don't get much better than a horny neighbour suggestively asking Scissorhandz to trim her bush. Meanwhile the show's construction as a jukebox musical is clumsy, and turned me against it quickly: Yes, I can see how a song called "Zombie" might have a thematic link to a reanimated supernatural creature, but not changing any of the Cranberries' original lyrics means Scissorhands is explicitly singing a song about the Irish Troubles in an unrelated scene. Having got the rights to Christian Rock anthem "Bring Me To Life," you might assume Bredeweg was spoilt for choice: The scene of someone being literally brought to life? Or use it for the story's rabid Christian fundamentalist? Neither, Peg and Scissorhandz sing it to each other when they first meet.

Other baffling choices include the title character getting a big dramatic entrance out of a trunk; long after the audience has already seen the costume (Abby Clarke's costume designs are great) in an opening monologue and a musical number. And after making no attempt to link most of the song choices to the narrative, a trio of nosy neighbours (Tricia Adele-Turner, Ryan O’Connor & Annabelle Terry) announce they've invited themselves round to Peg's for a kiki, so them breaking into Scissor Sisters' "Let's Have a Kiki" later loses all element of comic surprise. I don't want to keep going for the jugular because its heart is in the right place and the singing talent is genuinely impressive all round, but Scissorhandz doesn't work either as a retelling of the story itself (the song choices are way too haphazard to contribute to that,) or as a parody of it; both get in the way of it becoming the new and defiant queer story it's actually aiming for.

Scissorhandz by Bradley Bredeweg and others, based on Edward Scissorhands by Caroline Thompson and Tim Burton, is booking until the 29th of March at Southwark Playhouse Elephant.

Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes straight through.

Photo credit: Danny Kaan.