High School Musicals

I mentioned recently that I was surprised to be played an interval advert for a forthcoming show. We decided to go and see it- an Amateur Production of We Will Rock You.

Written by comedian and author Ben Elton (Blackadder, The Young Ones) in collaboration with Queen members Brain May and Roger Taylor, We Will Rock You is a fantastic stage experience.

Set in a tongue-in cheek dystopia where the Earth is ruled by commercial forces and everyone uses the same computers. Rock music is forbidden and evil mega corporation Globalsoft are tapping into people's thoughts.

However, resistance is growing and the rebel “Bohemians” strive to restore freedom of thought, fashion and music! Join them as they bravely begin the search for lost instruments of rock 'n' roll as they encounter the dreamer Galileo, misfit Scaramouche and ageing hippy librarian Pop. The Bohemians are here to bring back rock n’roll!

The show was very well done but the plot can best be described as contrived, being a device for linking most of the Queen back catalogue. It will come as no surprise, therefore, to know that characters include Killer Queen, Scaramouche and Galileo, traveling to the seven seas of Rye. Being written by Ben Elton it has lots of tongue in cheek song references.

This show was "produced with the kind permission of Schools Will Rock You" and it seems that the Production is being made available to Schools cheaply and easily (£120 license for 7 shows in 18 months). I suspect that this was actually a technical tryout of the package as it seemed true to the West End Production (from what I can see here- with a bit of scaling down to fit theatre and budget) and had a full backing track. (The Musical Director appeared to start the songs and then conduct). It didn't use the schools logo above but something similar to the West End one.

Expect it in a High School near you in 2008...