‘Asks too much’
I genuinely believe in the transformative nature of song, allowing us to voice deeper truths and confront harsher pains. Yet the more complex and portentous the subject matter, the lighter the tread, the bigger the balancing act, and the deeper the gaping chasm below.
Aside from that impenetrable and ambiguous opener, Cable Street brings together a set of actors who sing and dance as if their very lives depend on it. Originally premiering at Southwark Playhouse in 2024, written by Alex Kanefsky with music and lyrics by Tim Gilvin and directed by Adam Lenson. It received much praise, completed two sold-out runs, and has now transferred to the Marylebone Theatre. The subject matter is one I am sure is close to many of our readers’ hearts: the 1936 defeat and routing of Oswald Mosley’s Blackshirts by 200,000 Londoners-a consortium of East End Jews, Irish dock workers, the Communist Party, and many others. This year marks the 90th anniversary.
Yoav Segal’s set (Segal’s grandfather, Ubby Cowan, was kicked by a police horse in the battle) does its best with the long, thin stage, 60s council houses looming a little disconcertingly over the 30s furniture, with a proscenium of jagged wooden slats above.
The cast are asked to be every nationality, every race, gender, and temperament-in one instance falling onstage, presumed dead, sneaking off and then running back on as the person who found their own body. Demanding, impressive, ludicrous, and a little tiring. Debbie Chazen especially plays an Irish mother, a police officer, an old‑world Jewish grandmother, various bit parts, and the framing‑device American tourist searching the East End for her dead mother’s past. I don’t know how she doesn’t have a heart attack every night in the interval. Preeya Kalidas, as both a disabled northern mother and the fiery Isadora Gomez (a freedom fighter against Franco’s nationalists), breaks and ignites hearts respectively. Barney Wilkinson, as Ron one of our angry young male leads tempted by the beguilements of the British fascists, astounds with a belt that would break glass. Romona Lewis‑Malley as the other lead’s sister brings the vocal fire also. Jez Unwin has the honour of singing the song that started the whole journey, Only Words, about the toll of antisemitism and the plea to God to spare his ex‑boxer, violent son from racist retribution.
Isaac Gryn as Sammy the son in question and the second lead, equally struggles with the pressure of masculinity and Jewish identity in 1930s Britain. Doing his best with the Hamilton‑via‑Whitechapel rapping, he seems to want to break into body‑locking throughout-which hasn’t been invented yet. Other issues arise from a lack of originality in the writing, and some directorial choices prove shifting sand beneath all the tireless performance construction stacked above.
Some of the most wince‑inducing musical‑theatre rhymes are deployed, and “my street” morphs into “our street” in the rosy glow of acceptance and victory in the final moments. An uncomfortable-and, I would argue, inappropriate-moment is the BUF entering as a 90s boyband with matching choreography (from Jevan Howard‑Jones): armbands flashing, lightening a moment that should have been shocking. Later, however, when Wilkinson raises his salute, the needed gut‑punch of that simple movement is delivered, and the audience gasps.
Lenson’s direction asks too much of the cast: haring around playing every bit part, staging a full‑blown riot on the long stage and singing at the same time. The intensity starts at 1,000% and therefore numbs the heart and mind to the intended crescendo. Gilvin’s musicality grinds out the peaks and troughs of every Off‑West End musical angling for a transfer-which they have now achieved, with an Off‑Broadway stint in April. The romance, community, and eye‑glistening from the actors at the end feels all too desperately bought.
Heart in the right place is sadly not enough for such an important part of British history, with consequences we are still maddeningly grappling with. The BBC’s recent series Outrageous takes a lighter touch to the Mitford sisters and their aristocratic love affair with British fascism. This show could have been the perfect counterbalance, showing what it was like on the ground in 1936 for real working people. Instead, it makes a song and dance over something that was neither melodious nor razzle‑dazzling, prompting us to question “does everything need to a musical?”