SPEND, SPEND, SPEND

at the New Wolsey Theatre Ipswich

10.11.10

for The Public Reviews

Here's Viv, blowing her own trumpet, working as a stylist in Salon Mystique, raising the steel shutters to turn back the clock, roll back the years, to the days before the Big Win, when she was still a simple lass, selling Kia-Ora in the cinema.

Spend, Spend, Spend is a musical based loosely on the rise and fall of Viv Nicholson, the coal miner's wife from Castleton who scooped a record pools jackpot in 1961.

We're in Blood Brothers country here, musically and dramatically, Billy Elliott territory, something of Sondheim too, in one or two clever lyrics. It's gritty, hard-hitting and very funny.

The story is a powerful one. The message is clear, and certainly bears repeating fifty years on: money does not always bring happiness. This version has all the more impact, is all the more enjoyable, for having a company of twelve actor/musicians who play all the parts and all the instruments too: Viv's trumpet, accordion, flute, sax, pub piano, and a drum kit tucked tidily into the snug behind the bar.

The miners' local, and various bedrooms, in posh Garforth, in New York, see most of the action, and the two dozen musical numbers keep the pace lively. No real showstoppers in Steve Brown's serviceable score, but many delights, including the hint of calypso in Ice Cream Girl, the touching Canary in a Cage, the glorious title song. with almost everyone tarted up as bunny girls, the big emotional duet Who's Gonna Love Me, and the dance of love with a “complete total stranger” stripped of his fireman's uniform. One of the more surreal scenes has Keith, the boy next door, playing his cello under the undies on the washing line.

Karen Mann was a gutsy Viv, still ready to raise two fingers to the world, ruefully looking back in amazement at the naivety and the excesses of her life, but never complaining, never excusing. She shared the role with Kirsty Hoiles, outstanding as her younger alter ego – a neat trick which afforded many poignant moments. Greg Barnett was Keith, her second husband who helps her drink her winnings away and dies on the road to the races, with Graham Kent a strong Yorkshire presence as her abusive Dad.

Tom Gearing was the show MD [and Viv's grown-up son], and it was all directed and choreographed by Craig Revel Horwood. The ingenious and evocative design, neatly combining the pub, the bedroom and the salon, was by Diego Pitarch.

The moving ending – before the reprises – is Viv's visit to their old terrace house, where she watches the Viv and Keith who might have been waltz gently out of her life.

this piece first appeared on The Public Reviews