No freak show — Everybody's Talking About Jamie is a musical with a gender-transcending hero

Daily Maverick

6 days ago

Based on the true story of a British schoolboy who set out to attend his high-school dance in a dress, the show addresses teenagers on their own terms.
Despite some salty language and a scene or two featuring teenaged boys comically discussing rapacious plans for their ambitious penises, Everybody's Talking About Jamie hits just the right notes for young audiences caught up in some of the existing and emerging complexities of our time.
The British musical is based on a 2011 documentary (Jamie: Drag Queen at 16) about a Sheffield schoolboy who not only wanted to attend his high school dance wearing a dress, but also aspired to become a drag queen. The show premiered in Sheffield in 2017, became a hit on the West End and on Broadway, and was turned into a film.
It owes a little something to everything from the transformative magic of Cinderella to the queer celebration of cross-dressing in Rocky Horror. And, like the musical Kinky Boots, it explores drag culture in the context of a poorer, working-class north England town.
Its message of acceptance, of self and others, though, is universal. And vital. It takes on homophobes, absent fathers and the tricky path to unconditional self-love (don't worry, the path is definitely not twee), all while making a case for mean-spirited dullards to stop policing other people's identities.
The iteration that's just opened in Cape Town at Artscape's intimate Arena theatre is a student production, a showcase of the triple-threat talents of a large ensemble cast from the Waterfront Theatre School.
Challenges for young cast
It comes with plenty of challenges for the young, enthusiastic cast, including Sheffield (and Jamaican) accents, boys sashaying and dancing in heels, a set that gets a little bit in the way of the action, and – along with a lot of scene changes – a roller-coaster of emotional ups and downs on the way to catharsis, healing and redemption.
Whether or not all of these challenges are surmounted, isn't really the point. While the show perhaps lacks polish, it is not without its triumphs: there is tremendous life, passion and energy on stage – and the songs, the big-hearted story and the celebration of an independent spirit will win you over.
And while some of the best scenes are its intimate moments (such as when Jamie's mum, played by Danielle Bosman, tenderly sings about her unconditional love for her boy), it's the energising large-scale sequences that really make the Arena come alive with the whizz-bang choreography, the best of which includes riffs on ballroom vogueing and snatches of distinctly South African dance moves that make it all feel very much of the moment and quite close to home.
The titular Jamie New is played by the spry young John Marshall, who has both the cheekbones and the legs for the part.
Jamie's a bit of a paradox, though. Bright, sunshiny and perennially positive, there's something in the performance here that perhaps reflects the conservative backlash against personal freedom that is emerging across the globe. While Jamie exudes a fierce confidence that occasionally veers into unabashed narcissism, there are moments when he's less certain, almost held back, making him a lot more gritty and complicated than you'd expect from a teenage boy who, within the first few scenes, is given a pair of red high-heel shoes by his working-class single-and-struggling mum.
This isn't a show about a boy's battle to come out of the closet – we're beyond that, and Jamie is a hero designed for a brave new openminded world – but there are moments (such as when he butts heads with his school counsellor over his right to equality) when you're reminded of the ways in which the so-called Free World seems to be going backwards.
Marshall has a tough task balancing the multiple nuances and intricacies of the role, and he does a commendable job. What he allows to come through is the fact that the show is not actually about a boy getting his own way in an unjust world, but about a boy who learns that there is more to life than being the centre of the show.
Sure, everybody is eventually talking (and singing) about Jamie, but only because Jamie has nabbed the spotlight while disappearing into the guise of an alter ego – what he learns in the second act, though, is that there's more to life than 'me' (or Mimi Me, his drag persona).
As wonderful as Jamie feels when he achieves social acceptance (in the form of 'everybody' talking about him), the real lesson is that genuine happiness lies in self-acceptance, being himself rather than escaping into the superficial joy of wearing a pretty dress.
And while there's plenty of acceptance – from his mother, his best friend and by most of his classmates who don't seem to care either way about his sexuality – many familiar negative tropes and stereotypes are there, too.
Chief among them are his homophobic and neglectful father and a school bully who, in a touching performance by Khanya Gwe, manages to convey some glimmer of the broken soul that dwells inside Jamie's bigoted nemesis. Which means that, as much as this is one of those feel-good musicals with a predictably upbeat outcome, it's not without its more sobering moments.
The show is what some might call 'woke', with some colossal moments of the gay hero reclaiming homophobic slurs. It also shapes an interesting conversation around the theory (posed in the show by Asanda Mngadi's semi-retired drag queen, Loco Chanelle) that, while 'a boy in a dress is something to be laughed at, a drag queen is something to be feared'.
As it turns out, neither is true.
Charmingly bitchy
There's nothing at all scary, in fact, about the show's trio of charmingly bitchy queens – Laika Virgin (Andrew Woods), Tray Sophisticay (Andrew Ingram) and Sandra Bollock (Krys Igirubuntu) – who most precisely capture the spirit and energy of the musical. They bring biting humour, a touch of glamour and plenty of swank to their parts. And they make a pretty good go of stealing the show.
That said, not everything in this production coheres quite as well as the drag queens, and there are times when the cast seems a touch inhibited, when the actors underplay, forgetting that in musicals everything is heightened – or should be – so my sense is that it's a show that will improve with time as everyone finds their groove.
One harder-to-resolve problem is that the set itself impedes the staging. There's a massive, squat, pyramid-shaped rostrum in the middle of the performance space which, rather than serving the show, frequently squashes the action into uncomfortably restrictive spaces. There's also the question of the energy dropping off between scenes, which has the effect of making the show lag a bit.
To its credit, this production really manages to get into some of the deeper nuances of the story: that it's not so much about a boy figuring out how to get his own way, but about a boy learning that he is not the centre of the universe.
Jamie gets his much-needed lesson in inner beauty from his best friend, Pritti, a bookish, hijab-wearing Muslim girl played with diligent seriousness and real commitment by Kate Lagan. What Pritti conveys is the soul of the story: that real actualisation has nothing to do with fame, celebrity, notoriety or having everyone talk about you. Jamie's real journey is coming to terms with the fact that he is enough.
And if that's not a valuable message for young people caught up in all the nonsense in the world today, I don't know what is. DM