SCISSORHANDZ at Southwark Playhouse proves you need more than just mashing classic films with random jukebox scores to make a hit
“Ooh, baby, do you know what that’s worth?”
In this economy, you do what you can to make your musical stand out but SCISSORHANDZ‘s repeated insistence on flagging up Michelle Visage and *NSYNC’s Lance Bass as co-producers has always felt like a bit of a red flag. When you’re adapting a beloved 1990s movie and marrying it to an eclectic jukebox score from the 1990s and 2000s, you shouldn’t have to be relying on above-the-title names who aren’t otherwise involved.
Arriving at Southwark Playhouse fresh from a production in Los Angeles, writer-director Bradley Bredeweg assumes a lot of his audience, possibly too much. If you’re not familiar with Tim Burton’s film, I’m not sure there’s sufficient narrative clarity here, particularly as Jordan Kai Burnett’s Scissorhands rocks up onstage to tell their story in flashback, it’s all just a bit too confusing, that presumption that we’re all already onboard too big a leap.
The show also suffers from fatal inconsistencies in tone as Bredeweg tries to give us a meaningful queer reinvention of the story through the medium of raucous LGBTQ+ cabaret show. Issues of gender identity and othering thus have to battle with Belinda Carlisle and the Cranberries, the party vibe with which we open, suggesting affectionate spoof, pushed out of the way for increasingly angst-ridden seriousness that never convinces.
It’s well performed to be sure, and it is always a pleasure to see and hear the talents of the undersung Emma Williams. But Arlene McNaught’s musical direction employs too much strident belting in this limited time, James Connelly’s set design is too restrictive in the already limited space here and altogether, the hodge-podge of eclectic songs and loud characters fail to cohere in any consequential manner. Easily cut.
