Rating: ★★★★★
Venue: Soho Theatre, London
Cast: George Fouracres and Flo & Joan
Award-winning musical comedy duo Flo & Joan present their own original one-man musical about a very renowned gentleman. Starring George Fouracres (Daphne, Hamlet) as “the man”, and Flo & Joan as “the band”.
Directed by Georgie Staight (Operation Mincemeat).
Flo and Joan are a dynamic duo of musical comedy storytellers consisting of sisters Rosie and Nicola Dempsey who rose to fame accidentally after some clips they posted on social media went viral. They quickly became internet sensations and took their debut show to the Edinburgh Fringe in 2016, selling out the entire month-long run before it started. The pair have since appeared on stages and screens across the world, had three sell-out tours and multiple albums.
For anyone who has been a fan of these two for a while, you may have been thinking it’s about time they wrote a musical (myself included)! Well, your dreams have finally come true (perhaps they’re blessed with some sort of dream reading ability, who knows) as they have brought the One Man Musical to Soho Theatre after its raging success at the Edinburgh Fringe earlier this year.
Based on the first number, an absolute banger detailing the ‘legal minefield’ and red tape surrounding the production, I’m going to keep this vague, but as the pair quip in their first song ‘you better see the show today, because it might not be here tomorrow’.
A comedic ‘parody-esque’ style autobiographical show about one particularly prolific figure in the theatre industry, his journey to the top, successes, marriages (and divorces), and the many controversial decisions he has made and his inevitable heart-breaking ending as his career is ruined by a singular frozen pork chop.
The setup is perfect, with the band comprised of just Flo and Joan themselves and our protagonist portrayed brilliantly by George Fouracres, bragging that he gets ‘a show all about me’. George could not have been a better choice to portray our famous friend, with energy and comedic timing that imitated to perfection and powerful pipes to boot.
My absolute favourite moment was the song dedicated to his wives where the inspiration for the music came from a famous love song from an even more famous musical, and made my little autistic heart UNMASK and the happy stimming that followed was loud and proud!
With a revised ending set in the future where our protagonist is searching the newspaper for a review for his brand new production ‘Maggie Thatcher the Musical’, is this a hint to expect something new from this brilliant pair soon?
Flo and Joan have always been known for their razor sharp wit and fantastic comedic timing and this show is no different. With ingenious scores clearly influenced from somewhere *wink wink* but remaining entirely fresh, and utterly hilarious lyrics, this show has it all. I’m so glad to see it getting a further life as I’d hoped after the fringe, and it seems dreams really do come true. And we know quite a lot about dreams, don’t we……?
You can book tickets to One Man Musical, here.
Review by Rachel
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