The plot is as sparse as the instructions on a Bake Off technical, says Katie Jarvis. Yet for the Cheltenham Everyman audience, Great British Bake Off, The Musical, rose beautifully to the occasion
Pavlov and his dog discovered the curious phenomenon way back in the 1890s. By means of the expedient insertion of a small test tube, they proved that dogs could be conditioned to salivate even when played the very opening notes of the Great British Bake Off theme tune.
(Or something.)
Had the creators of Great British Bake Off The Musical inserted test tubes expediently into the audience at Cheltenham Everyman last night, they’d have been lost in a sea of expectancy the second the curtain rose.
But they knew that!
Of course they did.
Because the seats for this world premiere were jam-packed with fans already committed to love this musical. Soggy bottoms, teetering towers, dustbin-destined-disasters and all.
And, believe me, it’s great British fun – on a Swiss roll from the off. Faithful to every element of the beloved TV baking show (if you need me to explain, then this musical won’t be for you; it absolutely relies on the knowledge of the converted), there’s the tent; the individual work stations; the ice-cream challenge on the world’s hottest day ever; the eight contestants with a gratifyingly moving/funny/life-changing backstory: baking has wrought the kind of change that the mere fripperies of life-saving drugs or expert therapy have failed to achieve.
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So we have – to name but a few – 17-year-old Hassan (the excellent Aharon Rayner, making his professional debut – how cool is that!), an A level student, who arrived in the UK as a child-refugee from Syria; Cockney grandma Babs (Claire Moore); Izzy (Simbi Akande), the Cambridge history of art undergraduate, and almost-Bake-Off villain of the piece; Dezza (Jay Saighal), ‘Meat is murder’ (but who, unless I misunderstood, seemed inexplicably to cook lamb for one of his dishes). And then there are the love birds – the main play plot – the widowed Ben (Damian Humbley), and unconfident carer Gemma (Charlotte Wakefield).
So, to the showstoppers.
In my books, the star bakers were indisputably:
Paul Hollywood… here reborn as Phil Hollinghurst (played to perfection by John Owen-Jones) singing the hilarious Slap It Like That. Hugely enjoyable.
Ben’s scenes with his nine-year-old daughter Lily (a fabulous Ariella Elkins-Green in this performance) were genuinely moving. (And, at times, laugh-out-loud funny; not sure Liz Truss, the butt of one particular joke, would agree.)
Perhaps best of all, Phil and Pam’s (Pam being Prue Leith by any other name, played by Rosemary Ashe) duet, I’d Never Be Me Without You, has the makings of a Great British earworm.
(The mock cakes, designed by Alice Power, were spot on, too.)
If you’re going to pick holes, then the plot was as sparse as the instructions on a Bake Off technical. Yet the audience, with their instant standing ovation, was as hugely nuts for the show as any proud squirrel outside the Bake Off tent.
Everyman Theatre, Regent Street, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire GL50 1HQ; everymantheatre.org.uk
READ MORE: A look ahead to the 2022 Big Feastival in the Cotswolds.
