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