Spring Awakening

For all those who have been crying out for a gripping, controversial, and energising new musical, the wait is over. After taking over $50 million and grasping a swathe of Tony awards on Broadway, Michael Mayer’s production, inspired by Franck Wedekind’s 19th century play, has transferred to the Lyric Hammersmith’s stage and is set to take the West End by storm next month when it moves to the Novello.Set in Germany in the 1880s, the group of young adolescents, which the production centres around, are fast awakening to sexual discovery and no longer believe that babies are simply conceived by a visit from a mysterious “stork” in the night. While slimy Hanschen (Jamie Blackley) seduces innocent Ernst (Harry McEntire), Georg (Joe Slovick) fantasises over his piano teacher and Melchior (Aneurin Barnard) yearns to get closer to Wendla (Charlotte Wakefield), much of the first act revolves around the unconventional Moritz (Iwan Rheon) who is thrown out of school after failing his exams. Along the way he insists that best friend Melchior writes down all that he knows about sex and what it involves which only causes more confusion and questions to form inside Moritz’s fast developing mind. When his father disowns him, and his pleas to leave for America are rejected, he takes his own life.Perhaps the strongest part of this piece is the raunchy and up tempo music which is used not in a conventional musical theatre sense, where songs advance plot, but as internal monologues which draw us right into the inner world of the characters. The combination of Steven Sater’s lyrics and Duncan Sheik’s score is electric – when Melchior realises he is bound to be sent to a reformatory after it is discovered Wendla is pregnant, he leads the cast in a spellbinding “Totally Fucked” while the beautiful “Those You’ve known” sees the deceased Wendla and Moritz rise up from the grave to convince Melchior that they will “walk on his arm through the distant night and not let them stray from his heart”; a stunningly powerful and emotional end to the show.My only real gripe is that although the adult parts (played by Richard Cordery and Sian Thomas) are extremely amusing caricatures, they are not menacing enough to make you feel real sympathy for the children at times. Overall though, the young cast make up for this, particularly Charlotte Wakefield (Wendla) and Aneurin Barnard (Melchior) who are superb. Despite struggling on a few high notes, Barnard brings honest truth to his relationship with Wendla – a key component for a perfectly pitched second act. Meanwhile, Bill T Jones’ exciting choreography and Kevin Adams’ neon dominated lighting design add an extra dimension to the piece.This is not everyone’s cup of tea, but if you’re open minded and want to be blown away, Spring Awakening has real spunk. A must see.