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Helen Shapiro Walkin' Back

 
Richard Beck Review by Richard Beck 4 Published: 17 Oct 2025 Keiller Shopping Centre Show Dates: 19 Sep 2025-19 Sep 2025

Helen Shapiro was aged just 14 when she shot to fame in 1961 with two No. 1 hit singles, You Don't Know and Walkin' Back to Happiness. Voted “Number One Female British Singer” in that year and in 1962, record sales in excess of one million copies for each song gained her two gold discs, and she went on to become the teen sensation of the ’60s.

An entertaining, musically rich, multimedia experience

Her story is faithfully related in Kingdom Theatre Company’s biographical play Helen Shapiro, Walkin’ Back at Dundee Fringe, following a sell-out run at this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe. The production is an imaginatively devised piece of theatre that honours Shapiro while going beyond the style of a tribute show, performed by a company of student learners, not professional performers – though many have considerable experience for their years.

Despite the tight confines of the venue, and with help from CEO Lorraine Brown as stage manager and Lorna Cairns as production assistant, director Izzy Brown creates a split stage of a period classroom and the recording studios at Abbey Road. Costumes and hairstyles further faithfully confirm the age we are in.

A reflective prologue, complete with song from Erin Gilliland-Patterson as a mature Helen, sets the scene before we are taken back to her school days. Four girls sit at desks, one of whom is Lily B. Martin, also aged 14, playing Shapiro. How’s that for authenticity? She acts and sings with confidence beyond her years, while reminding us that Shapiro was just a very ordinary schoolgirl with dreams and the good fortune to be discovered. Martin’s command of the Shapiro songs and the many others specially written for the show by Willie Logan is remarkable. The new songs are well crafted and blend effortlessly into the musical genre of the day and John Murray’s script.

As we move through the years, her classmates (Mya Harley, Sadie Lax and Betsy Simmons) grow with Helen and display their outstanding vocal talents as her backing singers and in songs of their own. We meet her songwriter John Schroeder and hear some fine vocals from Theo Hart in that role, also doubling as John Lennon. Scott Hunter, meanwhile, reveals the politics and pressures of the business as the astute producer Norrie Paramor at Columbia Studios. Meanwhile, Anne Hart as Helen’s teacher remains left behind as a doubter of Helen’s dreams.

The show is slightly cumbersome in places, but there is nothing that couldn’t be made smoother and slicker in a more expansive venue. All the elements make for an entertaining, musically rich, multimedia experience.

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The Blurb:

Helen Shapiro Walkin’ Back is based on the early life of UK singer Helen Shapiro. By age 15 in 1961, she had two No 1 singles selling 40,000 records a day. By 16, she had five top ten hits and toured the UK with The Beatles as her support. This premiere has a talented young Scottish cast for award-winning Kingdom Theatre Company with a sold-out Fringe 2025. With original songs plus the hits of the day like Walkin’ Back To Happiness, this will whisk you back to the 1960s with an authentic vibe.