FOR many years, one of the great teats a group of us enjoyed was to go on Shrove Tuesday to a friend’s house to enjoy home-made pancakes. Good cook as she was, we were never offered the first pancake made, because she said it was never up to the standard of those that followed.
Anyone who saw this musical adaptation of David Nicholls novel when it previewed at Bristol Old Vic in February 2024, and now compared it with this new production, would agree with the pancake makers’ assessment that the second offering is far superior to the first protestation.
The production, even with a ten minute delay for a technical fault on Press Night, is slicker and smoother, with each scene segueing seamlessly into the next. Some of the characterisations have been toned down so that they look more like real people with whose highs and lows we can identify, rather than show-piece individuals intended to display the acting and singing talents of the actor.
Although it uses the iconic TV quiz show University Challenge, still on our screen 63 years after its initial outing in 1962, as its centre piece, this is principally a coming-of-age story. Brian. played and sung with tremendous commitment and belief by Adam Bregman, is a highly intelligent Southend-on-Sea, lower middle class young man besotted from childhood with being a member of a University Challenge team. He faces unforeseen challenges when he leaves his over-protective widowed mother Irene (Mel Giedroyc) to lose his way among the personal and academic problems he meets at Bristol University.
Swept off his feet by Imogen Craig’s rich, selfish and self-centred Alice, Brian moves away from his roots, only coming to his senses when Mel Giedroyc (who reserves her flamboyant personality to portray Bamber Gascoigne’s assistant Julia), tells him how lonely life has been for her. It takes an even bigger shock before he realises what a true friend his unemployed childhood pal Spencer (Christian Maynard) is. Or just how he really feels towards Asha Parker-Wallace’s strongly portrayed brutally honest Scottish socialist activist, Rebecca. Asha just about takes the vocal honours from Adam Bregman.What a pity there isn’t an immediately memorable solo number for them to exploit in a score that fits the story line rather than excites the musical taste buds.
Much easier to define are Brian’s relationship with Will Jennings, ever-anxious as the fraught team captain Patrick, fellow team member, Lucy, an American medical student honed to just the right sharpness by Miricle Chance, and Rachel John, hitting an ideal note and running out of patience as kindly tutor Dr Bowman.
Hovering over the whole event like a puppet master is Stephen Ashfield’s Bamber Gascoigne, making fine use of some of the clever narrative lyrics, and handling the final quiz in true Gascoigne style …hich he will continue to do at the Bristol Old Vic until Saturday 11th October.
GRP