"OK Stuart, so we're going for the big finale now and you're giving us some of your most emotionally-charged vocals and Ian Charleson-nominated acting, really belting the song out, tears streaming down your face, the works. But GET THIS! Nobody will notice any of it, because they'll all be looking at the bloke dressed as a giant space turtle flailing around on the floor trying to get off the stage before the bows. Yes, I thought you'd like it."
Theo Jamieson (book, music and lyrics) and Adam Lenson's (co-creator and director) musical Flyby has, it's fair to say, quite a lot going on. Astronaut Daniel Defoe (Stuart Thompson) disappears from a space station during a mission, hijacking an escape pod in what appears to be an act premeditated and planned for years in advance.
As he floats away into oblivion, a chorus of employees at the European Space Agency (Rupert Young, Gina Beck and Simbi Akande) try to piece together what could have possibly caused... bad breakup, it was all down to a bad breakup.
We flash back to his relationship with Emily (Poppy Gilbert,) daughter of a famous movie director (Young) known for his many affairs and disturbing children's films, and a mother (Beck) with early-onset dementia. It's left her with a very abrupt nature that tips into outright enjoying cruelty, whether her own or that of the bullying boss she idolises. How she and Daniel, a sensitive scientist who appears to be neurodiverse* and has mentally logged every instance of cruelty he's experienced since his birth, ever ended up together for more than five minutes is a mystery, but the relationship does inevitably fall apart.
So we've got a setup with multiple high concepts vying for attention and a central couple it's impossible to root for. I might have been more on-board if Jamieson's music had clicked with me, but while it's got some of the catchier elements of modern UK fringe musicals, it also has a lot of influence from the off-Broadway likes of Dave Malloy and Michael John LaChiusa, the sort of complex, often discordant sounds I tend to struggle with.
If I can't say the show itself was for me Lenson's production is at least impressive: Thompson's vocals and performance are powerful, Gilbert injects some humanity into a sadistic character, and the chorus do their best in the rather awkward role of hovering around a young couple's relationship. Libby Todd's set manages to mix the sci-fi with the domestic, as well as providing a lot of screen space for the (uncredited on the show's website) projections, which include a lot of fun Easter Eggs like the complete list of things Daniel has taken umbrage at throughout his life. It's all very well put-together, but didn't really add up to anything that hooked me into its story. And then Great A'Tuin turns up, trying desperately not to crash into the front row.
Flyby by Theo Jamieson and Adam Lenson is booking until the 16th of May at Southwark Playhouse Borough's Large Theatre.
Running time: 1 hour 50 minutes straight through.
Photo credit: Alex Brenner and Tristram Kenton.
*Emily does make a passing reference to Daniel possibly having Asperger's but, in completely on-brand fashion, only to make fun of him
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