By Aline Mahrud

WORTH A LOOK?: ****

WHEN?: Saturday 6 January 2024, runs through 2 March 2024 RUNTIME: 130 minutes (including a 20-minute interval)

It’s an absolute joy to be in the front row of this intimate space which allows this new British musical about facing the challenge of a life-threatening injury to be realised triumphantly.

• Read on for reasons including how we had tears in our eyes almost throughout

We’ve seen all 4 previous productions at this venue – Marvellous, As You Like It, Medea and the monsta-winning Brokeback Mountain – and The Little Big Things is the 1 that benefits the most from being in the round with multiple exits for its cast, many of whom are in wheelchairs, to enter the stage.

We didn’t choose to see The Little Big Things when it opened last year because we wanted to hear the songs 1st – music by Nick Butcher, lyrics by Nick Butcher and Tom Ling and a book by Joe White, based on the Sunday Times best selling memoir of the same name by Henry Fraser – and they dropped on Friday (5 January 2024) including some of the most chart-friendly, modern and Ed Sheeran-esque we’ve ever heard in a West End musical.

The story also is not familiar musical theatre territory and Fraser’s real-life tale of suffering a life-changing injury on a Portugeuse holiday with his brothers celebrating a rugby victory begins where most musicals end with a ‘no pressure, no diamonds’ sporting challenge which Fraser rises to.

Its theme of growing up and facing a challenge life has thrown at you reminds us of 1 of our favourite ever musicals Everybody’s Talking About Jamie although it’s southern and middle class rather than northern and working class.

The action isn’t linear and there is a build to the accident as we follow Henry’s exploits abroad in Praia da Luz in 2009 including in a bar to the joyous and very Ed Sheeran-sounding Uma Vida (One Life) but also a reflection on life afterwards with Henry played in a wheelchair by Ed Larkin with the able-bodied Henry he might have been thanks to Jonny Amies never far away.

We loved Linzi Hateley – who we remember opposite Jason Donovan in Joseph at the Palladium – as Henry’s mum Fran who looks back upon his young life in song One To Seventeen as she comes to terms in a Portuguese hospital with what has happened.

Actress Amy Trigg plays crowdsurfer Agnes who is also now in a wheelchair and her song Part Of The Plan (sample lyric: ‘Who was this girl I didn’t recognise? Where was her fighting spirit? Stuck at a crossing always looking behind that young crowdsurfer at the front of my mind. Took almost losing her to finally see I wasn’t going to let this take the very best of me.’) foreshadows the journey Henry must go on.

Who couldn’t be moved by Henry’s song Why? as he muses on life after the accident and says: ‘I hadn’t seen my reflection since Portugal.’

The musical made its world premiere in the West End and was originally scheduled to run until November but extended to March 2024.

The production is directed by Luke Sheppard (who helmed & Juliet and gives us Just For One Day at the Old Vic in January) and in the programme he writes: ‘To my knowledge, it’s the 1st West End musical with the leading role played by a full-time wheelchair-using artist.’

Among the cast we recognise a strong Amies from TV’s Sex Education and Hairspray at the Coliseum and a well-voiced Cleve September from Bonnie and Clyde at the Arts Theatre.

We found The Little Big Things very moving, had tears in our eyes almost throughout knowing the inevitable accident to come but also that a different kind of triumph is required to meet the challenge set.

• Main picture via Facebook courtesy Nimax Theatres
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