Having been born at the end of the 1970s and come of age in the 1980s, or the last time pop music was truly great, there was no sweeter spot from which to appreciate the genius of the Stock Aitken Waterman Hit Factory.
To see the triumvirate of Mike, Matt and Pete on stage at the curtain call of this musical based on their phenomenal back catalogue was akin to witnessing deities descend from musical Mount Olympus.
But not even their beatific approval can hide the utter bizarreness and often quite offensiveness of the story sandwiched around their perfectly crafted pop songs.
Debbie Isitt is a gifted writer and director, her ability to paint comedy in the broadest of brushstrokes while shooting straight into the core of emotional truth rewarded with Baftas and Emmys aplenty. That isn’t evidenced here, where Turkish waiters have Manuel-ian accents and where a joke about a masseur called Hassan willing to give you “Indian head” makes it past the taste filter.
The story on which the perfect pop songs hang doesn’t redeem the offence: Ella is jilted at the altar by Nathan, over a misunderstanding that could have been cleared up with a two-minute conversation, she goes on honeymoon to Turkey with her pals, Nathan realises his mistake and tries to win her hand in marriage, again.
In many ways it doesn’t matter that random story strands appear out of thin air; when you have actual Kylie appearing on a magic mirror you have licence to make the story weird, but the songs deserve better, or at least more coherence.
When the songs are centre stage and it becomes a vehicle for the Hit Factory, the show flies, the choreography from Jason Gilkison is exemplary and performed with real star-turn panache by Lucie Mae-Sumner as Ella.
The dancing in the aisles would have you believe it’s a great night out and in many ways it is, just don’t scratch the surface and accept it’s better the devil you know.
• At Manchester Opera House until 25 November. Then touring until May 2024.
