Butter Side Up Theatre Company’s Spring Awakening The Musical – 16 August 2024, Sheffield Library Theatre

Review by Claire Taranaski.

I came into this production with incredibly high expectations, firstly because the first time I saw Spring Awakening The Musical in 2018 it was the one of the first musicals to blow my expectations away in regard to what a musical can be and secondly because Butter Side Up’s production of the Green Day musical American Idiot last year blew me away in the same way. With all this expectation I was delighted to quickly discover that Butter Side Up had smashed it with an exciting production that was both sexual and sensual, passionate and powerful in everything from the cast, who were all perfectly cast to the modern choreography (thanks to Jamie Cooke) and the stunning vocals and musically accompaniment (thanks to Alice Copestick and Tommy Roberts and on a side note giving me serious conducting envy) that was equal to the Broadway cast recording album that I brought the day after I last saw it.

For those of you who have not come across the show before, Spring Awakening is a rock musical set in late 19th century Germany following a group of teenagers as they navigate adolescent, desire, love, loss and tragedy in a repressive society.

All of this I remembered from my first time seeing the musical, but what I had forgotten, blocked out or just stayed with me more this time as I have had a child in the meantime, is that it is a study of abuse and its impact on young people. From the education institutional abuse of Mortitz played by Elle Madeira (whose performance and character arch took me back to the late 1980s and Grange Hill’s Danny Kendall) to the shock of Martha played by Georgina Gregory’s daily abuse from her father, ignored by her mother. All these elements makes the show a lesson to the audience that we should try and always be there for and look after each other whatever we and they are going through.

In regard to the music, as someone who owns the soundtrack (if I didn’t I would have ordered it after last night’s performance) I had a big grin on my face from the opening notes of “The B**** Of Living” and “Totally F*****” and these musical numbers were bold and exciting, but Rudy Richardson’s performance as Wendla on the opening number “Mama Who Bore Me” gave me goosepimples from the moment Ruby opening her mouth, and Georgina Gregory and Emily Capp as Ilse’s performance of “The Dark I Knew Well” and Ewan Fellows as Melchior’s “Left Behind” moved me close to tears. However the song the company made it’s very own is one of my all time favourite musical numbers “My Junk”, which through clever cut aways and arrangements should be a version of the song that any companies performing the musical in future should take direction from.

Not only were the musical numbers outstanding (Butter Side Up can you do a cast recording?) but every cast member was to and they were all perfectly cast with natural talent, chemistry and stage presence. The show was one big highlight but within it I must mention the emotion individually and chemistry between Ruby and Ewan (the act one finale was an incredible combination of uncomfortable, innocence and mesmerising); the sweet kiss between Michael Hudson as Hanschen and Conor Varley as Ernst; and the cast member who played multi mothers of the various characters, who as a mum myself reminded me that at her heart she was just trying to protect the children in a very repressive society even if she was going the wrong way about it; and the cast members playing the teachers with the main giving me flashbacks to the Demon Headmaster and Grange Hill’s Mr Bronson.

From the production team I must also praise Becky Cleary whose direction brought the best out of everyone involved in a superb production that Butter Side Up made their own and set designer Robert Lee (the massive oak tree that was the centre piece of the stage with the band on one side was beautiful and a reminder that life continues before and after us).

My only disappointment last night was how few people were in the audience. This is a must see production of a must see musical, that not only deserves to be sold out but could quite easily go on a nationwide tour to rival any professional production. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that they get the audiences they deserve for their final shows on Saturday 17th August.