The worst kept secret in the world of musical theatre - that Addison Threadbone's "Sh*te: The Musical" [premiere Theatre Royal Corfe Mullen 1998] is officially the world's worst musical - is secret no longer.
Following an ill-advised revival at the Cattle Market Theatre Buckland Reapers this week, audiences have been able to decide for themselves - and have unanimously confirmed - that "this pile of steaming crap is one turkey that won't be re-appearing come thanksgiving" [Buckland Ripers Theatre Monthly]
Designed as a tribute to the composer on the occasion of his 90th birthday, the Nearly Useless Theatre Company combined forces with the trulyuseless company to present the work in revised [mercifully abridged] form. However, the road to hell being paved with good intentions, these good intentions led us straight to the heart of an unmitigated disaster in which the creative team and cast were as culpable as the composer and his lyricists in offering "the most meretricious, sentimentalised, half-baked, tired, cliched, underwhelming, embarrassing and pointless heap of theatrical dung yet to have appeared on the lyric stage". [Pamphill Playbill].
A disheartened cast was greeted at the end of the performance with a chorus of bewildered disbelief as the audience shuffled out of the theatre grateful only that the show was over. One audience member - who did not wish to be named - said that, like several others she had attended the show out of curiosity, certain that it could not possibly be as bad as she had been led to believe. "It was so much worse", she added, "the cast made the worst possible case for a musical that is simply beyond redemption; dancing, singing, acting, lighting and movement were just execrable, whilst the band was apalling". So was there any redeeming feature? "The back cloth was quite well painted and the auditorium chairs were quite roomy" she added; "and I quite liked the twinkly stars effect until it fell down, otherwise it was very awkward". "Well it certainly lived up to its name", one wit [Mr Wan Witt] quipped.
Others commented on the fact that the production might have benefitted from more rehearsal time: "the fact that those actors who had bothered to remember their lines kept f*****g them up and that several hadn't bothered at all and were plainly reading from scripts in a typeface even the visually impaired could read from the rear stalls was a bit of a giveaway really", offered theatre critic Noel Cowardly-Lyon.
The musical tells the story of ........
The production - which cost more than £150 to mount - runs until Tuesday. Like most of Dorset, the composer is not planning to attend.
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