Music: Andrew Linsley
Lyrics: Maria Kelly and Andrew Linsley
Book: Oonagh Johnson and cast
Director: Maria Kelly
Layla is a new folk rock musical which explores how far someone is willing to go to survive in an apocalypse, where anyone or anything could be out to get you. This new musical by Andrew Linsley and Maria Kelly has some great, if quite forgettable, musical numbers although, at times, as the cast are no microphoned it can be challenging to make out all the lyrics. The show is framed as a cautionary tale, with many of the cast singing directly to the audience, but the precise morals don’t seem to fully land. The parallels between our world and this apocalyptic world on stage aren’t made entirely clear.
Maria Kelly does a terrific job directing what feels like a bit of an epic journey in a very small space. She effectively uses the whole auditorium and makes clever use of shadow work to show the distance between characters.
Layla boasts a strong cast who are certain to go onto main great things in the future. Lowri Jayne Rees leads the cast as Layla brilliantly. She gives a moving performance, holding the audience in the palm of her hands from her first appearance. Her vocals are powerful, filling the room despite the lack of microphone. Marie-Laure Corben also has a terrific voice and, despite being the same age as the rest of the cast, brings a maturity to her role. She brings to life the maternal figure of Lorelei just beautifully. Reuben Foyle also demonstrates his fantastic singing ability as Grady, and adds some much needed moments of light and humour to an otherwise dark story. Anne-Marie Jaye delivers some of the more chilling and almost frightening moments of the piece very well, whilst Emilia Bailey very quickly becomes beloved by the audience. Bailey and Rees have a lovely rapport and it’s a shame we don’t get to see them go on more of a journey together. Andrew Linsley completes the cast as Dad and Miles. He brings Dad to life brilliantly, which helps the audience root for Layla as much as they do, and he is just antagonistic enough as Miles whilst having good reason for his actions against Layla.
Layla is a unique new musical that has the potential to be something special and hard-hitting. Hopefully as the show develops it can be expanded into a full length musical (it currently runs at around an hour) giving time for all the characters and their relationships to be developed.
Reviewed on 26th July 2023.
