By Neil Durham

WORTH A LOOK?: ****1/2

WHEN? Saturday 12 July, opens 18 July and runs through 23 August 2025 RUNTIME: 160 minutes (with a 20-minute interval)

Everything Stops For Top Of The Pops is the opening number of this new musical based on a film which encapsulates first love, the thrill of pop music and wanting to escape 80s Dublin for the freedom of London.

• Read on for reasons including why Sing Street is Once‘s cute younger brother and deserves a West End transfer

Our hero Conor is given a terrific turn by Sheridan Townsley making his professional debut and we join him as the new boy in a religious school who has invented a band to impress an older girl he fancies who he has asked to star in their music video.

We never saw the 2016 film but have heard the soundtrack and there are 5 new songs for the musical co-written by Danny Wilson’s Gary Clark including the vivid and extremely catchy scene-setting Top Of The Pops.

Writer and director of the film John Carney describes it in the musical’s programme: ‘Everyone remembers that feeling – first love, first band, first escape. It’s personal, but somehow universal.’

Asked about the songwriting with Clark he says: ‘We just tried to write like 2 teenage lads obsessed with Duran Duran and The Cure.’

Part of the charm of Sing Street is that the cast play their instruments onstage like the youngsters from School Of Rock and it endears them to us as they are finding a way through life, finding community through song and looking for a way out for something better.

Also impressing in his theatre debut is Adam Hunter, former lead singer of the brilliant HYYTS, who plays Conor’s elder brother Brendan who helps him with his pop dream but is also unemployed and too depressed to leave the house.

The musical wouldn’t work without a convincing muse for Conor to write his 1st songs about and Grace Collender has the look of a young Sophie Ellis Bextor and brings a believable vulnerability to model Raphina’s initial brash exterior.

The book is by Enda Walsh (Once and Lazarus) and, although we struggled with the latter, Sing Street – the title is a play on the name of the school Conor goes to – is very much the cuter younger brother of the superior and quite moving Once.

We’ve criticised Jamie Lloyd (EVITA, London Palladium) for his over use of live camerawork onstage shown on a screen but it’s perfectly in keeping with the 80s fetish for early music videos and works well here.

Sing Street deserves a West End transfer and we think the theme of finding a voice will chime with its audience and the songs – including the ridiculous The Riddle Of The Model and the joyous Up – will hook on 1st listen.

There’s also subplots about standing up to the school bully but also the unfairness of authority which will inspire and this is a new musical which deserves to find its own Top Of The Pops.

• Main pictures via Facebook courtesy Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith Tickets
• Have you seen a Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith show before and what did you think of this 1? Let us know what you thought in the comments below
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