Starlight Express, answer me yes?
The famous Andrew Lloyd Webber Musical has been playing for some time at the Wembley Park Theatre just a stones throw from the famous Wembley Stadium, and I had the chance to see it a few days ago.
The show, with music from Andrew Lloyd Webber, lyrics from Richard Stilgoe and book from Arlene Phililips, for those of you who don’t know it, has been around since the 1980s, and over the years has seen a few revisions and different iterations of the production that have somewhat evolved the show over the years. I say this not because I’ve seen the show many times, but because by the time the show got to the interval I had to look up two things about the show.
Firstly, I needed help to figure out what on Earth the show was about, and secondly, I wanted to look up to confirm if the show had been written whilst the playwright was recovering from a serious head injury or if they were shortly admitted to a drug rehab clinic.
The story is actually quite simple. A kid is playing with some toy trains and then is put to bed by their parent. It would seem in the original production the kid was a boy and the parent was Poppa, but in the version we saw it was a girl and her mother. Then the entire rest of the show is the kid’s dream about the toy trains who are now talking beings on roller skates who are going to engage in some all important series of races.
Along the way, the story focuses on an old steam train called Rusty who is in love with an observation deck carriage called Pearl.
I’ll be honest, I don’t think I was paying enough attention as the show moved from the kids bedroom into the world of the train dream as at first I thought the weirdly costumed roller skate dude and dudettes were meant to be representations of the planets. Just before they entered a large solar system of planets are dangled from the ceiling of the theatre and I guess are meant to be like a baby’s mobile dangling from the ceiling and just represent the space setting for the train races.
As well as Rusty and Pearl there are other train characters who represent freight trains, Hydro Gen who is a more modern steam train, Greaseball who is the current champion in the space races and Electra, who was such an overly camp villain I expected Adam West’s Batman to come in on rollerblades and tackle him to the ground.
From what I gather the name Starlight Express refers to the space train god who the trains pray to. So, yeah, the story is simple, but also bonkers and confusing. I guess this came before we got the likes of Disney and Pixar’s Cars and Planes, although long after the world had Thomas the Tank Engine.
The songs are all pleasant to hear, with the titular Starlight Express song being perhaps the most well and a favourite. I really enjoyed the mostly commentary accompanied instrumental tracks used for the various races in the show. These added a lot to the excitement of the racing segments of the show. Momma/Poppa (in this case Momma) has a great song which is funny and just weird in that it pretty much just describes the mechanics of singing a blues song.
Of course there’s also a soppy song, and you’ll watch on hoping that Rusty can win over Pearl by the end. I do take a slight issue with the plot here as Pearl literally never chooses Rusty for the races. He wins her over when she gets ditched mid race and he comes to her rescue, but with the multiple races, you’d think she would form an alliance with him for the final race. Nope. She also goes elsewhere, but at least they end up together in the end.
There’s a couple of cast members who are on scooters who do some cool spinny tricks on the ramps, although the main characters don’t take big risks to do many tricks on their skates. I guess this makes sense as the cast could risk serious injury and need a huge pile of understudies if they were taking more risks whilst also trying to sing and act.
Conclusion
Just go and see it and don’t think too deep about the universe of the trains who fall in love and you’ll have a great time. The show is all about the spectacle of the performers on roller skates and this unique element will make it quite unlike anything else you’ll see.
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