In The Time Of Dragons

Review of In The Time of Dragons at The Edge.

For its new musical In the Time of Dragons, The Edge artfully creates a sixties nightclub vibe – with a dressing room in one corner, piano in the other, lamplit cabaret tables along one side, and big neon sign.

The Blue Angel obviously doesn’t like to keep its punters waiting. We’ve only just taken our seats, when Sheelagh, the club’s resident songbird, is hurried centre stage to perform at her spot lit mic.

Bits of backstage gossip bring us up to speed with Sheelagh’s unhappy relationship with husband Frank, dresser Ann’s secret crush, and the Polari-fluent club owner’s date with a Polish sailor.

Now at this point, it’s probably worth breaking the news to fantasy fans that they can pack away the cosplay outfits – there are no actual dragons! Just metaphorical ones, in the shape of big beastly seemingly insurmountable problems keeping some of the characters awake at night. Although, that’s not to say strange things don’t happen…

Switching suddenly from 1965 to 2024, we meet Jack a decidedly unhappy music teacher. After a failed relationship he is struggling to connect with his students and starting to rely on alcohol to get through the day.

When husband Frank’s infidelity causes Sheelagh’s marriage to implode, she has to find alternative accommodation. In two mirroring scenarios, she moves into a Salford bedsit, just as Jack arrives in exactly the same spot 59 years later.

Somehow the combination of a thunderstorm, a malfunctioning plug socket, and a touch of electrocution bring them closer together across time. In the same space – but each in their different eras. Not visible to one another but able to hear each other’s words, and sense when they’re together.

Let’s take a breather here, because you might be thinking (a) this sounds like a piece of special effects laden, big budget nonsense, or perhaps just (b) WTF.

Can I reassure you that no compass or map are necessary to help navigate the plot – and it’s all done with the lightest of touches, the swiftest of set adjustments, and some clever lighting.

In some ways Sheelagh and Jack are very different people. She busily unpacks a lot of knick-knacks to make the bedsit a home; he arrives with his belongings in a bin bag and a dead houseplant. He only sees big dragon-sized problems, she is all about tackling things a bit at a time.

Yet they have both got lost in bad relationships, losing sight of what really matters to them.

Meagan Keaveny and Rupert Hill are both very likeable, creating characters to root for. Keaveny’s Sheelagh is sunny, practical, and open to the idea of a different future – while there’s a more vulnerable element to Hill’s Jack, adrift, and in search of a mooring.

They bond over a love of music. Especially the sounds of the sixties – The Beatles, Dusty, The Kinks. Sheelagh complains that she is struggling to make a success of her career as she isn’t from Liverpool, “Manchester and music don’t go well together”.

Janine Waters’ nimble writing is full of humour. Some of it playing on the benefit of our modern-day hindsight – or there are flashes of irony, some gentle ribbing, and the occasional winking innuendo.

Yet, the show also makes serious points, through its songs and dialogue, about topics such as being queer in the sixties, toxic masculinity, and even the stresses of modern-day teaching.

One big number, Frank’s Lament, sees Sheelagh’s husband (played with arch charm by Tom Guest) shruggingly chronicle an endless list of laughably appalling behaviour, content to “blame it on (his) big Y chromosome”.

Sheelagh’s gay colleagues from The Blue Dragon (Hannah Nuttall and Tom Guest) storm through a tuneful ‘celebration’ of the oppressive times in which they live, mockingly proclaiming how they ‘love’ to be blackmailed, arrested in public toilets, and laughed at in public – “hopeful, it’s not like we’re hopeful”.

It’s one of many points well made, with Waters’ words landing some solid punches wearing the velvetiest of gloves.

The music by Simon and Alec Waters (with Alec playing piano to strong effect in the show) is mainly keyboard and guitar driven – although it manages to travel impactfully through a range of styles. Jazz-inflected torch songs, a blast of bossa nova beats, and echoes of Badly Drawn Boy.

Hill often accompanies himself on guitar and Jack’s songs are delicately downbeat and contemplative. As night club chanteuse Sheelagh, Keaveny gets to go big on emotion, and lay on the drama. “You’re as good a singer as Cilla Black” someone says encouragingly backstage. She’s better.

David Howarth’s well thought through costumes – be they Jack’s heavily crumpled work suit and lanyard; or the retro glamour of Sheelagh’s glittering gold sequined dress and Ann’s bespectacled black-clad beatnik look – help to quickly establish character and period in this pacy production.

Back in the bedsit, Sheelagh and Jack help each other to move on, both making something new from their shared ‘now’.

“There’s going to be a really boring explanation for all this”, Jack says confidently to Sheelagh when they are first flung together via a flash of lightning. Well, whether there is or isn’t, the outcome is certainly not dull.

This is a fleeting escapade of a show – best enjoyed in the moment, and imbibed like a fizzy flavour-packed tonic.

A musical about a shared love of music, with a message about conquering fear and following your dreams – In the Time of Dragons may not breathe fire, but it warms the heart.

The Edge.

Performance seen on 21 February 2024.

In The Time Of Dragons runs at The Edge, Chorlton from Monday 19 February to Saturday 9 March 2024.

Images by Joel Fildes.