Backstairs Billy – The Duke of York’s Theatre – Saturday 13th January 2024

(Rated 3/5) Written by Marcelo Dos Santos, ‘Backstairs Billy’ is the story of the relationship between Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother (Mum of Queen Elizabeth II in case anyone is not aware of who she was), and her manservant, William ‘Billy’ Tallon. I imagine it is inspired by the facts, as much as it might be possible for the author to know them from public records, and from those who knew Billy. It is entirely set in Clarence House, in 1979 and 1951, the latter being when Billy first met the Queen Mother (QM) at the age of 15 years old. He had written to the then consort Queen Elizabeth and her husband King George VI, asking whether he could be of service to them. He would remain working as an ever increasingly closer companion to QM, until her death in 2002 at the age of 101. Billy survived her by only 5 years, dying in 2007, when he was 72.

OK, so why this one, you may ask… or even if you don’t, I’m going to tell you 😉 As many others did, I felt a great fondness for QM, and in the past have really enjoyed stories of Queens and their servants – ‘Mrs Brown’ and ‘Victoria and Abdul’, with Judi Dench as Mrs. Brown aka Queen Victoria to Billy Connolly’s John Brown in the former and again Judi with Ali Fazal as Abdul Karim in the latter. AND, as with Dame Judi too, I have a great love of Dame Penelope Wilton, yet never seen her on stage. Dame Penny W, (to distinguish her from Dame Penny Keith 😉), has appeared in numerous stage and screen roles – my personal favourite being as Harriet Jones, MP for Flydale North and then Prime Minister in ‘Doctor Who’. Remember, ‘We know who you are’ lol.

The play is much more about its titular character than the QM. He is played by Luke Evans. We witness how the innocence of young Billy (Ilan Galkoff) being taught to dance by QM transforms to the power and control older Billy came to have over proceedings at the QM’s engagements, particularly when she received visitors to the Garden Room in Clarence House. We see the clash that develops between Billy’s personal gay lifestyle and the etiquette of functions hosted by QM. It is a gentle, light-hearted romp in the most part… until it isn’t, and Billy gets too big for his boots and receives a pretty shocking put-down from QM! Very rapidly after that the play finishes, which feels a little odd. As an audience member, I felt too much in shock to fully appreciate the joy of a mostly beautiful relationship between them.

Pre-show the gay anthems of 1979 play loud and proud in the auditorium of The Duke of York’s Theatre, getting us in the mood 😉 Though, I did naively comment ‘This doesn’t sound appropriate for the Queen Mother’! So, this is one, I’m glad to have seen, but wouldn’t recommend as such. Penny W was very good as a Penelope Wilton version of QM, but didn’t convince me as QM in my own imagination. Tom Rand created her outfits, and they were very QM as we saw her in public. Luke Evans is fine as Billy – though I don’t know how Billy was! – and did some good impressions of now King Charles and Princess Margaret. But, something was missing for me in them together – though I obviously can’t say how them together were!! There was some lovely dancing, some amusing farcical happenings, oh, and… some real live Corgis, but not enough of the latter for what I anticipated!!!

‘Dear, oh dear’, as The King might say about this play featuring his Granny 😉 BackstairsBilly – Review by TheRestrictedReviewer © 2024

The Time Traveler’s Wife Musical – The Apollo Theatre – Saturday 23rd December 2023

(Rated 5/5 Musical, 7/5 Book, 5/5 TV, 3/5 Film)

Audrey Niffenegger's 'The Time Traveller's Wife' is in my top 5 favourite books (alongside George Eliot’s ‘Middlemarch’, The Works of William Shakespeare, Michael Cunningham’s ‘The Hours’ and (maybe?) Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’). I so love the story I've now experienced it in 4 different media, and they are all associated with special memories. I first read the book on a weekend Mum- and Fred(dog)-sitting. Sadly, Mum was on a major low, but looking after her was always special to me. I sat on the sofa, with Fred lying across my left hip, and read to the end, never wanting it to finish Later, Mum would enjoy the same copy of the book, pictured in accompanying photos. I saw the film for my birthday in 2009 with friends. None of us were very impressed, but still a beautiful memory. I watched the TV series on my own sitting in Mum's chair, and absolutely loved it - written by genius TV scribe, Stephen Moffat and with one of my newer favourite actors, Rose Leslie, as Clare - I love her beautiful, sensitive, expressive face, and Moffat adapted it very cleverly, embracing the skill of apparently chaotically jumping around in time, yet in a very structured way, in Audrey Niffenegger’s book.

And now I've seen the stage musical and made more special memories with my sister-from-another-mister (she knows who she is 😉) .Such a fabulous day and experience. We both felt Act2 was better than Act1 – mind you that is usually the case as first acts usually suffer from having to set things up and so maybe come across as slower and less dramatic. We found Joanna Woodward as Clare initially a little too ‘shouty’, but I think in time, (pun actually unintended), forgave her and she did sing and perform very well indeed. David Hunter was a great Henry, and we especially enjoyed the dance/movement section in Act2, exhibiting his time-travel. My theatre companion really liked Tim Mahendran as Gomez, and whomever we had as Young Clare/Alba (Ava Critchell/Poppy Pawson/Lily Hanna/Holly-Jade Roberts) was adorable. The idea to create a musical of the book came from Producer Colin Ingram’s Wife 😊 (how appropriate!). The book was adapted by Lauren Gunderson, who wrote about how efficient a musical has to be, compared with an original book, which allows the development of concept, characters and their relationships to grow gradually, intricately and – in this case – so artistically creatively over time, yet with all sorts of time shifts too. The musical had to come right in there with the first song telling us the nature of the big issue in Clare & Henry’s lives together, whilst in the book, the structure and skill of the placement of their meetings at different ages and times, so providing different challenges to them both at each meeting, is part of the extraordinary genius of Audrey Niffenegger’s composition. An additional draw for me (as if it being one of my favourite stories wasn’t enough) was that the music and songs were created by Eurythmics Dave Stewart and Joss Stone. I’ve said before that I love the way a song in a musical is able to encompass the essence, story and motivation of the particular character singing it. Clearly, there are other songs, and some duets, some ensembles, which provide other aspects of the whole production. The staging was magical and, for me, the whole show moved me to tears.

So, I'm still thinking about my 'leader board, but The Book definitely top, the film definitely bottom, and, in the words of Claudia Winkleman 'everybody else in between' TheTimeTraveler’sWife – Review by TheRestrictedReviewer © 2023