Closer to Heaven, Arts Theatre, 2001
Cast: Frances Barber, Paul Broughton, David Burt, Jo Cavanagh, Akiya Henry, Paul Keating, David Langham, C. Jay Ranger, Mark John Richardson, Stacey Roca, Richard Roe, Louis Spence, Mark Stanway, Amanda Valentine, Tom Walker, Marcos White.
Music & lyrics: Pet Shop Boys
Book: Jonathan Harvey
Director: Gemma Bodinetz
Set & Costume Design: Es Devlin
My favourite band made a musical - imagine how excited I was! They wrote this after hating Les Miserable (me too!) and hoped they might modernise musical theatre. They didn't but it modernised itself thanks to a lot of young people writing about things that were important to them. I've seen it revived twice and still listen to the cast recording. Es Devlin got really big after this and designed a show for Kanye West. Jonathan Harvey's bio in the programme mentions in the forthcoming projects a film of Marian Keyes book Rachel's Holiday and a film starring Graham Norton, neither of which ever happened. Unusually for a Pet Shop Boys project there's no interview with them in the programme but it's a keeper anyway.
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