Theatre review: Wasted

"Fuck off, I'm writing Jane Eyre."

The success of Hamilton on both sides of the Atlantic means musical theatre throwing distinctly anachronistic musical styles at historical figures are all the rage, so it's a pleasure to report that even with all that going on Wasted feels pleasingly original - and bonkers. The Brontës were a quartet of troubled artists who didn't fit into the world they were born into, faced romantic problems and drug addiction, but briefly became a popular sensation (and hugely controversial because of the bad influence they might have on their fans) before fizzling out and dying young. At least that's how Carl Miller (book and lyrics) and Christopher Ash (music) see them, framing their show as a Behind the Music documentary about a band who barely made it past one-hit-wonders, and interviewing Charlotte - the last left alive, having given up writing and married a dull curate - about what went wrong.

Adam Lenson's production puts the Brontës on a raised wooden stage (designs by Libby Todd) with a band behind them and a central bank of sockets into which the siblings plug their microphones at the start of the show.

Charlotte (Natasha Barnes) is the bossy oldest one, Emily (Siobhan Athwal) the "goth before her time" and Anne (Molly Lynch) the quiet one dreaming of finding a husband. Brother Branwell (Matthew Jacobs Morgan) is of course the Ken of the band, his tragedy (but also Wasted's biggest running gag) being that he's convinced he's the true genius of the family. As Branwell swans about trying to decide whether his genius lies in art, music or poetry, his sisters quietly get on with writing first poetry (a failure that sold only two copies in their lifetimes) and then novels (critical flops because they might corrupt the young but huge popular successes) which Charlotte convinces the others to have published under male pseudonyms. The show plays with the popular conceit of showing a long-dead figure how loved they would remain centuries later - but they're dead, they could never know that so as far as Charlotte's concerned they all went to their graves having wasted their lives.

The real Brontës' story might have had death looming over it at every turn ("Why don't we ever spend time in the garden?" "Half our family's buried in it") but Wasted is typified by a lot of witty lines ("I don't want to go on holiday to Bridlington, why can't we go to Glasstown?" "BECAUSE WE MADE IT UP!") as well as a bonkers conceit that Lenson's production has a lot of fun with. Nowhere more so than in Athwal's portrayal of Emily - it seems so obvious in hindsight, of course she would play Emily Brontë as Kate Bush, flapping around the Yorkshire moors staring wildly into the distance. Accompanied by her beatboxing dog.

My regular complaint about the sound mix rears its ugly head again - in the group numbers especially the lyrics are hard to make out. But although there's probably a few too many of them (27 in total) Miller and Ash's songs include a few real standouts. Though many are a bit samey there's some playing with different styles (country rock for Anne's "No-one to Marry For Miles," and whenever Charlotte gets sent an abusive letter Athwal and Lynch rap it to her,) while Charlotte's "(Extra)Ordinary Woman" is a proper banger that got stuck in my head after just the one listen - Barnes' belting voice really brings the house down but all four are strong. It's daft, energetic fun with a bit of heart in there as well, and a tracklist I'd download if they ever did a recording (unlikely, unfortunately.) Some people clearly hated it - I had a lot of fun.

Wasted by Carl Miller and Christopher Ash is booking until the 6th of October at Southwark Playhouse's Large Theatre.

Running time: 2 hours 45 minutes including interval.

Photo credit: Helen Maybanks.