Long before the post-university romance of David Nicholls’ novel One Day came to the screen, there was his coming-of-age story Starter for Ten, featuring a first-year university student from Essex, adapted for film in 2006.
That film, with its star-studded cast (James McAvoy, Rebecca Hall, Benedict Cumberbatch) and 1980s soundtrack, is partly the basis of this musical adaptation about Brian Jackson’s quest to get on to the TV quiz show University Challenge – and also get the girl, of course. Directed by Charlie Parham, it begins faithfully, with Emma Hall and Parham’s book replicating the film’s screenplay (also written by Nicholls). But it becomes more original and amusing, if madcap, when the book swings off-piste and goes its own way.
In Brian’s journey from Essex to Bristol University, there are issues of identity and class which are channelled through humour here. Some characterisation is too broad, and Mel Giedroyc, as Brian’s mother, is an especially generic Essex caricature. But Brian is more textured and Adam Bregman plays him endearingly, bringing a distinctive singing voice with flecks of Morrissey.
His push and pull between posh-girl Alice (Emily Lane) and protester Rebecca (Eubha Akilade) gives the story its class satire and comic bite. Alice is a horsey Sloane, excellently hammed up by Lane in songs including For the Story, whose every line drips with Chelsea girl parody. Rebecca is here a sarky Glaswegian who rails against apartheid and urges the boycotting of Barclays (so what’s changed?). She could have grated but Akilade has a winning emo awkwardness. Actors double in roles and as the anarchic comedy amps up to riotousness, so Giedroyc appears in the show’s most surreally entertaining incarnation as a TV exec who looks exactly like Margaret Thatcher and sings Cream of the Crop in that vein.
The music, by Hatty Carman and Tom Rasmussen, is infused with synth sounds and musical debts to the likes of New Order and Eurythmics as well as Brian’s beloved Kate Bush. The songs are full of energy and funny lyrics (written by Hall, Parham, Carman and Rasmussen) although not all are catchy in themselves.
Part of the show’s delightful scrappiness is Frankie Bradshaw’s flimsy mobile set as scenes play out against a bland back-curtain. The recurring figure of quiz host Bamber Gascoigne (Robert Portal) addresses the audience or breezes comically across the stage with a television showmanship reminiscent of Bruce Forsyth.
The energy of the show becomes unhinged after the interval, with too many unmemorable songs that lose the story’s central focus. More jarringly, the ending pulls the punch of Nicholls’ original to absolve Brian of wrongdoing and renders his journey towards coming-of-age enlightenment incomplete. It is a shame because until then, it is a very fun ride.
At Bristol Old Vic until 30 March
