Review: Choreomania (Patrick Studio, Birmingham Hippodrome)

Review by Clancy Haynes

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As part of the Expressive Arts faculty in my Primary school, I help to produce a musical each year featuring a cast and crew of about 50 nine and ten year olds. While the months leading up to the performances are often filled with panic, despair, tears, and the occasional need for a lie down in a dark room, the experience is incredible. To watch children, who may find traditional academic subjects challenging, displaying talents for acting, singing, dancing, prop creation or music tech that have previously been dormant, is heartwarming.

Actually, it’s more than that. To watch a child who thinks they’re “rubbish at maths” or “can’t do anything” belt out a Disney classic in front of a full audience and then come off into the wings shaking with excitement and wanting to do it again and again makes my heart want to burst. It is a tragedy that the arts are being squeezed out of the curriculum and that children whose natural talents lie in this direction may never have an outlet to discover and nurture them. In view of this, it is so important that groups like the British Youth Musical Theatre exist to provide children with opportunities to experience what a career in the theatre could be like.

In partnership with the Birmingham Hippodrome, the British Youth Musical Theatre (BYMT) is performing Choreomania, a movement led piece with music that mixes medieval influenced singing and contemporary electronic dance music. Choreomania refers to the phenomenon of dancing plagues that occurred between the 14th and 17th centuries in Europe, which were well documented but, ultimately, unexplained. These plagues were characterised by an uncontrollable mass urge to dance until exhaustion and, on some occasions, death. Choreomania tells the story of one of the more notable outbreaks, which occurred in 1518 in Strasbourg, with some accounts suggesting up to 400 townsfolk were affected.

The production starts with a Les Misérables style ensemble piece that sets the scene of a town ground down by hunger, drought and poverty, led by a corrupt clergy who uses the people’s predicament and their fear of Hell to exert control and exhort what little money or goods they have. As some people decide to leave the town, others choose to stay and hope that their lives will improve. One unhappy, daydreaming woman can feel something coming through the ground and left on her own, begins to dance uncontrollably. Spotted by her husband and other townsfolk, she ignores their pleas to stop and continues her dance, with others being drawn in. As the church begin to manipulate the people, one priest sees the injustice and hypocrisy but is also unable to resist becoming drunk on power himself. Elsewhere, a group of rag tag child thieves who have previously stolen from the town, now want to save it with love and compassion.

The dancing and movement pieces are where this production sparks to life as the jerky, seemingly uncontrollable, independent movements of each dancer start to coordinate to the horror of the onlookers. The young person who plays Anna, the original dancer, was incredibly talented and I felt as drawn in by their dance as the townsfolk did. The dance segments of the story are exhilarating to watch as the unsettling movements creates both excitement and tension within the audience as well as the townsfolk. The dancing continues to be a highlight throughout the production as more and more characters join in.

The musicians in the band were fantastic, seamlessly blending traditional medieval pieces with a heavier, more contemporary beat. Although some characters had recurring sung motifs, the production had a sung through feel with few songs that had a sense of a traditional beginning, middle, or end. I enjoyed the differing styles of characters, with the townsfolk singing in a more traditional musical theatre way and the clergy usually having a more speak-singing, rap style, particular the rap battle-esque conversations between the two main members of the clergy. This helped to highlight the differences between the two groups and worked well. Many of the performers had strong voices and while there were clearly some nerves on display, they all worked hard to perform to the best of their abilities. There were a few technical issues with the microphones, and it was great to see that the actors weren’t phased by this and behaved like pros.

The press material, and the production itself, seemed to suggest that it was set in Strasbourg, 1518. The signs on the set, some of the language used and the costumes seemed to suggest a more modern time or even a dystopian future. While I understand there are limitations on what can be achieved in productions like this, I did feel that they were easily avoidable and at times I felt they were a bit jarring. I wasn’t sure whether it was a deliberate choice considering the modern elements in the music and while it ultimately didn’t matter, it did confuse me a little.

I know that it isn’t easy to stage a production with young people, especially something as high concept and ambitious as Choreomania. It is however important that it happens and for that I am thankful. There was a lot of talent on the stage tonight and I have no doubt that while some may choose to continue with musical theatre as a hobby, there were some there who will be our musical theatre and dance stars of the future.

Choreomania played at the Patrick Theatre in the Birmingham Hippodrome from the 29th to the 31st August.

For more information and to keep up with BYMT’s future productions visit https://britishyouthmusictheatre.org

Photos by David Lindsay