Five years ago, Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran created a “50’s jukebox musical” called Dreamboats and Petticoats. It told the story of Laura, Bobby, Norman, Sue, Ray and Donna, six Essex teenagers starting out in life and singing along to some of the biggest hits of the late 50’s.
Time has moved on for the six of them now and, as the curtain opens, we find ourselves in the early sixties in order to catch up with their unfolding lives and, accompanied by an equally outstanding soundtrack of massive early sixties hits, the next instalment of the story unfolds.
Bobby and Laura had a huge success with their debut single, Dreamboats and Petticoats but are really struggling to replicate that success with their follow-up singles. Norman and Sue are now married, and expecting their first baby and Ray and Donna seem to be doing just fine, although she is uneasy about his flash job as a Bond Street ladies hairdresser.
Many of the original touring cast return to take up the roles that they previously played in “Petticoats”, which gives Dreamboats and Miniskirts a real air of authenticity and allows the audience an opportunity to like, or dislike, the familiar characters all over again.
Having said that, the two male leads and now played by new actors with Alex Beaumont playing the naïve and impulsive Bobby and Ross William Wild taking on the role of the sewage worker and soon to be father, Norman. Not only do the actors portray their characters superbly, but they also use their fantastic voices to blast out the majority of the songs in the show.
Elizabeth Carter returns as Laura. She is now disillusioned with the pop music business and is searching for a new direction, which gives her the chance to sing an amazing array of songs including It’s in His Kiss, Maybe I Know, Stay and, my personal favourite, You Don’t Own Me.
Donna and Sue, Played by Louise Olley and Anna Campkin, provide superb backing vocals for Laura as wall as taking the lead with songs such as I Only Want to be With You and Be My Baby.
Most of the supporting cast are actor / musicians who are, quite simply, at the top of their game. They play over 40 songs in the show as well as adding to the dialogue and joining in the dance routines – without even breaking into a sweat!
While I’m talking about dancing, special mention has to go to Josh Tye who, as Derek, displays some incredible dance moves whenever he gets the chance and, thankfully, he gets a lot of chances.
The storyline of the show is not exactly complicated, with misunderstanding, mistrust, jealousy and uncertainty pervading throughout with, as one would expect, the final 20 minutes of the show allowing all the pieces to come back together – just in time for a full company finale.
Overall the show is a sure fire hit, the singing is top class, the catalogue of hits is vast and the acting is believable although, it has to be said, there is something missing. Maybe the set is not to the same quality as the singing, maybe the plethora of songs means that the opportunities for dialogue are not sufficient or maybe the characters just aren’t really likeable enough but, although the rest of the audience seemed very happy, I was still waiting for that “wow” moment.
**** Four Stars