Review: JACK - The Musical (Courtyard Theatre)

Review by Matthew Plampton

⭐️⭐️

Following on from a run at Edinburgh Fringe, JACK heads to London for a run at Courtyard Theatre in a new musical seeking to reframe the infamous story of Jack the Ripper. Aiming to present the audience with the chance to step away from the fixation and at times glorification of the male perpetrator and instead examine the real impact on the five victims at a time when misogyny and inequality were rife. This is a period of history overdue for a theatrical retelling that honours the victims and highlights their erasure; however, this piece misses that chance and at times is regressive with its message.

JACK came across as an attempt to merge the Jack the Ripper story with elements of London Road, Six, and the recent Coven. These three musicals are effective in their message, as they give dimensions to their characters, heart, passion, and most importantly, the audience is drawn into their story with heartbreaking effect. In a piece about the devastating murder of five women, it was incredibly hard to feel emotionally engaged, which came down to a mix of problems involving the book, score, direction, and production execution.

The book by Sahar Malaika is tonally mixed, with the opening scenes creating some misplaced jokes as the police assess the victims, instead of creating an intense sadness and fear over the tragic murders that have taken place. The female characters themselves lack any arc or depth, except for what felt like a shoe-horned love affair, which means their one-dimensional natures fail to pull the audience in. The male characters are deliberately clichéd in nature, which does initially drive home the misogyny message, with the drunk, abusive partner, the corrupt, power-hungry journalist, and the arrogant police obsessed with labelling all the victims as prostitutes.

However, the message gets lost, as without spoiling the plot twists, there is an attempt as the piece develops for Mary Jane Kelly (the final victim) to reclaim the story, through the revelation of her own acts. Nevertheless, this only took away from the real point of the piece, which should have been a focus on misogyny, male violence against women, and the erasure of victims; instead, it spreads the blame elsewhere and took away Mary’s status as a victim. This conclusion leaves you confused as to the message, as you are left questioning the validity of this being only gender-based violence, and whether this was all part of a greater scheme orchestrated by women to highlight their oppression at the time. Either way, instead of intensifying the message, this diluted it, leaving you questioning the morality of Mary’s acts.

Sam Phillips’s score features a juxtaposing electro-gothic sound to effectively contrast against the Victorian backdrop, which has some real moments of power and at times, worked to create songs that were able to develop and move the plot along. However, it is difficult to comment further on its merits, as most of the songs were inaudible due to a sound production issue, which meant a majority of the lyrics were lost. Furthermore, there was never that pivotal moment to emotionally engage the audience or feel like the women had truly reclaimed their story.

The cast is primarily made up of students at Oxford University, early on in their theatre careers. Standout performances were given by Nicole Palka and Sorcha Ni Mheachair, as they delivered some powerful vocals and touching moments of heartfelt vulnerability. The direction by Rossie Sutton and Sasha Ranawake feels underdeveloped, lacking cohesion, primarily causing the scenes to feel stilted and at times awkward, especially as the piece develops. Furthermore, it never really seemed to build on the intriguing set design of Ted Fussel, with its floor of newspaper stories and backdrop of interwoven red strings, which promised an intriguing concept that was never realised. This lack of cohesion was exacerbated by the costumes by Elodie Yip, which featured both Victorian and modern elements, creating a confused look, alongside Hannah Wei’s lighting choices, which did not create the impact they could have. 

There is a moment of poignancy towards the end of JACK, where the victims’ names were projected onto the stage, alongside more recent news reports of infamous gender-based violence. This raised the thought-provoking question of whether anything has actually improved for women since the Jack the Ripper murders, however much we like to pat ourselves on the back and think the world is far safer now for women. It was this message that needed to be the heartbeat of the show, yet unfortunately, the book and score fail to deliver it, and instead, we are left with a piece that detracts from the actual victims. The Jack the Ripper story is crying out for a musical that can effectively reframe the narrative to shed real light on the victims and the message that gender-based violence is still a prevalent issue; unfortunately, this production is not it.

JACK plays at Courtyard Theatre until 11th January. Tickets from https://thecourtyard.org.uk/