Writer and Director: Mark Tunstall
Adults dressed as children aiming for a Roald Dahl meets Edward Lear style anthology of naughty and beleaguered children, Mark Tunstall’s Kidults! The Musical presents jaunty morality tales but without a clear sense of connection between the 24 songs. With no obvious structure, this new musical struggles to hold together. Performed at the Bridewell Theatre with a cast of 16 performers, the shape and tone of Kidults unfortunately lacks a clear sense of purpose.
Part of the issue for Tunstall’s show is that an overarching structure or theme has yet to be established in a scenario that is sometimes a circus, sometimes the woods and sometimes the school playground with a musical score by seven composers that ranges from 80s comic storytelling to rock n’ roll and vaudeville. Who are these children, and how do they know each other? Are they in the same school, live on the same street, or perhaps they are a collection of random urchins that Tunstall’s Fagin-esque ‘Narrata’ has collected for his circus-like a child-snatching Papa Lazarou? We never find out, although the children he claims are also his school memories and ours.
Without this purpose, there is nowhere for the show to start from, no sense of integration for a collection of barely evolving songs. Some of the content raises concerns, including many numbers focused on bullying another child for being short (a missed opportunity for diverse casting), ‘greasy’, smiling too much or for being called ‘No Name’ – this latter song begins with some uncomfortable speculation about gender that bears no relation to the character’s lack of a first name. This culture of toxicity includes only minor punishments, such as a single apology to a child placed into a sack and beaten with sticks, providing no sense of morality or justice. Although Tunstall’s ultimate point is that childhood is cruel, it is surely not that lawless.
The much longer second act introduces dialogue that adds little more than the songs as characters talk about being an American arriving at a UK school, a silent child finding his voice and a boy whose parents have affairs, so he plays with rockets. Eventually Kidults! The Musical hints that it has been exploring the transition between childhood and adulthood with characters in their early to mid-teens, but with talk of college at the end, it’s not clear if the audience has watched them over several years nor do we pass any of the usual rites of passage like first kisses, weekend jobs and taking responsibility for decisions.
Writing an abstract or anthology show is far more complicated than stringing songs together – even absurdist theatre has rules – and Kidults! The Musical needs a spine, a central connection point off which these different narratives and experiences can hang. And from that, better decisions can then be made about whose stories are told, how they are arranged and the overarching messages that emerge from the show, including making use of the chosen device of grown-ups playing teenagers, otherwise, why not make this a youth musical?
This is heavy work for the cast, who do their best to sell it, but, like all teenagers, this needs more time in workshop to figure out its identity. It’s just not ready for an audience.
Runs until 26 October 2024
