When it comes to the internet, some people see the dangerous misinformation spilling over into the real world with dangerous consequences and they despair. Others look at this world of lies and conspiracy theories and say: let’s work through it by creating a lesbian romance hyperpop musical.
If the latter sounds like a too-online and too-unhinged response to the state of the world, then maybe Flat Earthers: The Musical isn’t for you. But write it off too quickly and you’ll miss out on a lightning-fast and slyly sweet show that will give you a couple hours’ relief from the horrors of living in 2024.
Written by ex-partners Jean Tong (a writer on Netflix’s Heartbreak High) and Lou Wall (whose last standup show The Bisexual’s Lament picked up awards at the Sydney Comedy festival and Edinburgh Fringe), with songwriting and musical production by James Gales (who worked with the pair on their first queer musical, Romeo is Not the Only Fruit), this is musical as meme: hyper-referential and contemporary. It is drenched in the current nostalgia for early 2000s aesthetics, with a sense of comic timing that’s deeply 2024. Does it always work? Absolutely not. Is it funny? Definitely.
Ria (Shannen Alyce Quan) is a conspiracy theory debunker who stumbles across Flick (Manali Datar) online. They fall for each other quickly and charmingly over direct messages and build a meet-cute out of emojis, but everything changes when Flick reveals herself to be a flat-earther – someone who believes the Earth is flat – who never leaves her parents’ bunker. Ria panics and, just like Evan Hansen, the protagonist of another musical that also just opened in Sydney, she lies online in order to be liked.
From there, the plot goes wild. There’s the community of flat-earthers (or “Flatties”, as they are affectionately called); there’s the Illuminati; there’s a plan to literally destroy the Earth that swallows the second act. There are video projections of memes, text bubbles for typing and, briefly, a pulsing light in that telltale Brat-green (Brockman is the set and lighting designer).
It’s messy and there is a lot to keep track of, like an overworked browser with too many tabs open. This production – co-presented by Hayes Theatre Co and Griffin Theatre Company – could have benefited from sharper dramaturgical editing at a structural level. Michelle Brasier makes a glorious villain out of Mz Prism, a woman with a plan to destroy the world, but her arrival lands awkwardly: she comes in too late to steer the ship but is handed the narrative reins anyway in the second act. It also would have benefited from a leaner runtime: Flat Earthers struggles to sustain its pacey momentum over two-and-a-half hours.
Several musical numbers feel unresolved as expressions of plot and feeling, favouring punchlines and beats instead (if you’ve seen Lou Wall’s deliriously funny and deliberately lo-fi Facebook Marketplace mini-musical in their standup shows, picture that and magnify it).
Declan Greene’s direction does manage to coax moments of joyous sincerity out of a cascade of jokes. Musical director Jude Perl is no stranger to combining music with comedy and keeps the energy high, while choreographer Fetu Taku playfully highlights character choices through movement. But it’s Brockman’s set and lighting, with video and animation by Xanthe Dobbie and Daniel Herten, that set the pace and tone: this is a musical that embraces the screens we all live between.
New Australian musicals are born out of an impossible environment, where writing and composing skills are not nurtured anywhere near as well as performers. In this sense, Flat Earthers acquits itself well. Sure, its elaborate second-act lesbian dream ballet would be funnier if it were actually closer to the dream ballets it parodies and, sure, its central, hopeful point would land harder if the characters’ journey towards it was clarified. But, for a show self-described as a musical for people who hate musicals, it delivers on its brief: Flat Earthers is still a good time.
Flat Earthers: The Musical, presented by Hayes Theatre Co and Griffin Theatre Company, is open at the Hayes Theatre until 9 November
