Oli Fuller
An hour of nostalgic music on a backdrop of the gritty reality behind what it means to be a hit boyband.
MAN!FEST: The Drag Boyband Musical follows Man!fest, the hit boyband that has all the girls drooling and all the producers scheming. The play not only presents itself as series of mini-concert moments from the band, but also looks into the inner relationships and lives of the members, while also looking into their social impact and the people pushing them behind the scenes. It is a clear parody of the One Direction craze of the 2010s and does an incredible job of bringing that energy to the stage.
The performances from Maddie Bell, Hollie Jameson-Clarke, Esther Dracott, and Emily Benucci are outstanding, with Maddie Bell as Cody being a stand out star. Bell showed incredible subtlety as they deteriorated physically throughout the piece, and we truly saw them become weaker throughout, with physicality sometimes worryingly immersive. When Cody eventually collapsed, it didn’t feel at all forced or like it came out of nowhere, you saw him push himself to those limits, you knew what was coming, and that made it feel all the more real.
Everything about the promotion of this show had me excited to see it, however I felt while the concept was excellent, in execution it fell flat. This is not to discredit the sheer talent of the cast and creative team, who have done an excellent job in creating a score and a plot that are intriguing and genuinely entertaining, however the show ended up feeling incredibly slow, with pacing issues throughout.
The music was beautifully written and performed, with songs that stood out as catchy and playful and completely in the spirit of One Direction’s style, whom they are parodying. However, the core joke of the majority of the songs was simply “this sounds like a One Direction song” which eventually lost its charm and drastically slowed down the show when each song continued for its full length after the first verse and chorus.
The biggest fault of the show was that it felt unfinished. The show ended at the climax of the plot, where the boys had reached the full extent of the physical and or social deterioration of their characters, but faced no conclusion. I felt as if there was a second half to the show that simply didn’t exist, as if I was going into the interval of a two act musical, not leaving a completed show.
Towards the end, it also became overly explicit in its social critiques, having the fan girl characters blatantly say “we’re teenage girls, we don’t get respect”, which felt almost undermining of the audience, removing any subtext that could be read.
I want more of Man!fest, and I want to see where their stories go. I am excited for the future of this show, to see past the climax and to reach a conclusion. With such incredible performances, it was disappointing to be left without getting to see how their story ends.
Recommended Drink: Red and blue mixed slushy in the one of a kind Man!fest arena tour plastic cup which costs £20 and will not survive the dishwasher.
Catch MAN!FEST: The Drag Boyband Musical at Pleasance Courtyard from August 5th to 31st (not 12th or 26th) at 16:00 (60 mins). Tickets are available through the EdFringe Online Box Office.
Lola Rose Wood
Hannah Hamilton
Freddie Haberfellner
