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Brief awakenings: White Rose The Musical @MaryleboneTHLDN

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A fascinating and daring act of defiance in Nazi Germany by a group of university students in Munich is given a slightly perplexing rock musical treatment in White Rose, the musical. Something seems amiss in this earnest and occasionally tuneful show. It lags more than it inspires, which is surprising given the tragic and compelling history of the real-life characters the show depicts. Given that young people are increasingly likely to vote for far-right parties across Europe, it’s an opportunity to look at a time when they had a different perspective on the future. Perhaps something has been lost in the translation or the larger space of the Marylebone Theatre where it plays.  The White Rose were a group of university students in Munich who sought to undermine the Third Reich through publication of a series of pamphlets urging passive resistance to the Nazi regime. Over a brief period between June 1942 and February 1943, they distributed their pamphlets across campus using ...

Windmills of your mind: The Memory Show @DraytonArmsSW5



The transformation of a mother daughter relationship as a daughter becomes a carer is at the heart of The Memory Show.

It's a new musical with book and lyrics by Sara Cooper and music by Zach Redler. It is having its European premiere at the Drayton Arms Theatre in South Kensington, for a very brief period.

Alzheimer's has inspired many creative works. From the book and film Still Alice and the recently produced play The Father. Here the same story is told, but with music. And it gives the piece a heightened sense of reality and emotion. And the natural performances from the two leads ground the piece and have you transfixed watching their journey.



Ruth Redman as "mother" opens the show. She sings about being asked stupid questions by doctors such as "who is the president of the United States?" But it is clear that she doesn't know the answer to it and her world is unravelling.

Her daughter, played by Carolyn Maitland, returns home to care for her. She is single, having let relationships pass her by. And she has had a turbulent relationship with her mother.

But past wrongs and lost opportunities give way as both characters have to face their vulnerabilities.

The production is simple, with some inspired lighting and projections by designer Will Monks to evoke the breakdown of the mind.


The songs are carefully placed in this piece. They come naturally to express the emotions and the anxieties each character faces. At times, the music and its New York Jewish-ness could have you forgiven for thinking it was a Jason Robert Brown show. But the originality of the concept, including songs about cleaning up toilets after your mother, gives the piece its strength.

In the show programme there is an advertisement for the Alzheimer's Society. It notes there are over 100 different forms of dementia and that by 2020 the number of people living with it is expected to be over 1 million. This show gives it another human face.

A fine production from New Bard Prodcutions and Verse Unbound. Directed by Alex Howarth and musical director Jerome Van Den Berghe. I look forward to seeing what they do next...

The Memory Show runs at the Drayton Arms theatre to 20 February.

⭐︎⭐︎⭐︎⭐︎

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