This is ABBA-solutely fatuous: a camp, spandex-thin celebration of friendship and a certain Swedish supergroup that starts from an implausible premise and gets steadily dafter. The debut play by actor Ian Hallard, who also stars, it details the foundation and demise of a gender-flipped ABBA tribute band in the West Midlands in 2015. Mamma Mia! Imagine that as a pitch to producers.
The show is inoffensive, insubstantial, very sporadically amusing and breezily directed by Mark Gatiss, who happens to be Hallard’s husband. After a tour and a run at the Park Theatre it now finds itself improbably filling a hole in the West End for a short run.
