Theatre review: Heathers the musical
The latest screen-to-stage musical adaptation to hit Adelaide is a reboot of the 1988 cult classic Heathers, bringing a message of tolerance and inclusion amidst the classroom bloodletting.
If you’re someone who’s ever suffered from low self-esteem – which is likely most of us – you might agree that high school can be tricky. There’s not only the pressure to achieve academically, but there’s a desire to fit in, and some crave and seek it more than others. Veronica Sawyer of Westerberg High would be one such person, only because she doesn’t trust she’ll make it out alive if she doesn’t have the popular kids on her side. Funny, then, that it’s the popular kids who might not make it out alive once they come in contact with Veronica.
Michael Lehmann’s 1988 film Heathers became an instant cult classic, thanks to its subversive black comedy and ‘It Girl’ Winona Ryder and a Jack Nicholson-esque Christian Slater in the lead. The film caused a stir in the day, with its teenage murder plot proving a surprisingly very funny premise. Then, in 2009, Laurence O’Keefe and Kevin Murphy adapted it into Heathers the musical, and it’s proved, surprisingly, even funnier. Turns out introducing 1980s high school storyline to a new generation through musical theatre doesn’t have to be cringey. Instead, the moments of poor taste – with its jokes about homosexual and overweight kids not aging very well – can be dealt with in a song that explains it away by camping it all up and becoming un-PC nostalgia, then ultimately offering a positive message.
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Touring constantly since it opened – from both coasts of the US and throughout the UK, to Australia and New Zealand – Heathers the musical is as much a cult classic now as it was when all the Gen Xers were watching it as an original film on VHS, and the audience at Her Majesty’s proved it. Filled with people in their fifties and young adults who couldn’t have been more than fifteen, it was a most enthusiastic audience. I asked a group of teenagers waiting outside the stage door for the actors to exit and sign their programs if the night had been discounted for musical theatre kids, since the energy was so incredible, to which they answered, “No. I mean, it’s Heathers.”
In keeping with the high school setting, it’s a young cast, with some making their professional debuts, and others only hitting the mainstage in New Zealand or working in major productions as understudies. This is not to suggest an overly green group of actors – Emma Caporaso as Veronica shines bright like a Disney princess in short, short skirt and matching blazer while instinctually maintaining an edge, and Calista Nelmes (Rent, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Season 12 of The Voice) as Heather Chandler is a standout, despite being the first to become a dearly departed. Gary Lloyd’s choreography is fresh and worthy of the laughter it receives, and the songs (also Murphy and O’Keefe) are catchy and clever, so there’s much to be applauded in this production. But nothing more so than the message that seventeen-year-olds will be seventeen-year-olds – and as awful as it might feel, hang in there, because this too shall pass.
Heathers the musical continues at Her Majesty’s Theatre until July 26
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