Not a Musical

I rarely rewatch films and hardly ever re-read books, even my favourites, so it is a huge endorsement that I wanted to see the current play at the Soho Theatre twice in the space of ten days. And truth be told, I could happily go and see it again.

The show is "Midsummer (a play with songs)", and I saw it for free as part of the theatre awards judging thing I do. I took a friend along to it, fearing the songs would put off the OH, who strictly does not do musicals, but it was so good that I thought he would enjoy and I wanted to see it again - I was even willing to pay to see it again.

It is a Scottish play (not the Scottish play) and I have admitted that I am definitely a Scotophile, plus it is about turning 35 (just a few weeks off for me) and the music includes a quick blast of the Jesus and Mary Chain, so I was always going to enjoy it. But equally the older people in the audience, who probably didn't own a Jesus and Mary Chain record between them, still seemed to love it too. And the songs were all really good too, sounding similar to Belle & Sebastian in places, definitely not like the songs you normally hear in musicals, but then this isn't a musical, it is a play with songs and that difference is important.

So if you are in London in the next two weeks, go to see this show. I thoroughly recommend it (although I'm beginning to think it may have been a mistake to recommend it to a couple of recently married friends who met in the internet as the play contains the line "Its an internet thing. I'll give it a year" which they may be offended by).