Book, Music and Lyrics: Benjamin Scheuer
Directors: Alex Stenhouse and Sean Daniels
This well-meaning one-man musical about a man struggling to make sense of his father’s death is ultimately too well-meaning for its own good. Although based on writer Benjamin Scheuer’s life, the message about the importance of family may be too cloying for some.
In this production in Southwark Playhouse’s smaller space, Max Alexander-Taylor plays Ben and the show begins with Ben being taught how to play guitar by his father. The first song about his cookie-tin banjo sets the tone for the rest of this 75-minute musical: slightly jaunty, slightly nostalgic, and yet somewhat ordinary. Even when the story hits darker moments, Scheuer’s songs keep the feeling light.
As a young boy, Ben dreams of forming a band with his two brothers Adam and Simon. However, his father, despite all the encouragement he gives, doesn’t believe that his sons, his ‘lions’ as he calls them, should pursue music as a career. Ben’s father is a mathematician and an academic and wants Ben to follow suit, and isn’t too happy when Ben’s school report shows a C Minus in maths. This rift between father and son is never healed, because a few days after another argument between them, Ben’s father suddenly dies.
We follow Ben over the next few years never really shaking off a sense of guilt that he is responsible for his father’s demise. He leaves school, plays electric guitar, meets a girl and falls out with the rest of his family. From a selection of five guitars, Ben has a song for each part of the story. Alexander-Taylor is an affable Ben, but sometimes his cheerfulness is at odds with the character he is playing. His voice is fine and measured, and every word is audible, but he never lets loose and so everything begins to blend into one, apart from the song, The Bridge, where Alexander-Taylor is able to show off his guitar-playing skills.
In a strange move, directors Alex Stenhouse and Sean Daniels have opted to keep on the house-lights for most of the show and Emma Chapman’s lighting design at first seems to have only two levels: bright, and brighter. Perhaps they keep the lights on to install a sense of intimacy, in the same way Alexander-Taylor makes eye-contact with as many people in the audience as possible. But the blazing lights are distracting, and it also means when Alexander-Taylor gets on his knees to serenade people in the front row everyone can see, and everyone shares in the embarrassment.
Scheuer won a fistful of awards when he took the lead in The Lion’s early days, in productions off-Broadway and in London’s St James Theatre. Perhaps there was an added layer of drama when Scheuer told his own story that is lost when someone else tells it. There is nothing wrong with Alexander-Taylor’s performance, but there’s something a little too safe about this lion.
Runs until 25 June 2022
