Review Roundup: A STRANGE LOOP Arrives in London

A Strange Loop has officially transferred from Broadway to London’s Barbican Theatre for a one-time-only 12-week limited season. The full cast is led by Kyle Ramar Freeman, making his West End debut reprising the role of Usher - which he played on Broadway - who grapples with desires, identity and instincts he both loves and loathes, all brought to life on stage by a hilarious, straight-talking ensemble of ‘Thoughts’.  

Thought 1 is Sharlene Hector best known for being a lead vocalist for British band Basement Jaxx, Nathan Armarkwei-Laryea (Women Beware The Devil, Spring Awakening, Hamlet) plays Thought 2, Yeukayi Ushe (The Lion King, Kinky Boots, The Book of Mormon) is Thought 3, Tendai Humphrey Sitima (The Play That Goes Wrong) plays Thought 4, with Danny Bailey (Jesus Christ Superstar, Girl From the North Country) as Thought 5 and Eddie Elliott (Blues for an Alabama Sky, The Lion King and Motown The Musical) playing Thought 6. 

Michael R. Jackson’s blisteringly funny masterwork exposes the heart and soul of Usher - a young, gay, Black writer who hates his day job, so writes a musical about a young, gay, Black writer who’s writing a musical about a young, gay, Black writer…a strange loop. 

Let's see what the critics had to say...

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Tim Bano, Evening Standard: Turns out, the US-specific stuff doesn’t matter. You’d be better off coming armed with Urban Dictionary, because this is probably the filthiest, most explicit show in London at the moment, dripping with bodily fluids and stiffened with extreme sexual fantasies, all part of the confused trauma of Usher’s mind. It’s also one of the most thrillingly strange, playful and hilarious new musicals to have hit a London stage in recent years.

Arifa Akbar, The Guardian: An intimate play about selfhood and artistic creation, it is full of paradoxes: camply funny with arch songs such as Inner White Girl, it is also painful to watch as Usher comes up against heinous racism in the gay dating world as well as homophobia in his church-going family. Sexually and racially explicit with repeated use of the N-word, there are graphic jokes about anal sex and Aids (with the repeated notion that Aids is “God’s punishment”), and the play uses Black stereotypes and caricatures, although remarkably, none of this feels gratuitous because it has been so carefully thought out by Jackson.

Dominic Maxwell, The Times:  Michael R Jackson’s Pulitzer and Tony-winning musical is about a queer black overweight 25-year-old usher at The Lion King writing a musical about being a queer black overweight 25-year-old usher at The Lion King who is writing a musical about . . . you get the idea. Along its critically heralded journey from off-Broadway in 2019 to Broadway proper last year and to this 12-week London run it has attracted backers including Steven Spielberg, the National Theatre, Jennifer Hudson and Alan Cumming. It is, scene by scene anyway, audacious and playfully resonant enough that you get the appeal (and why it received a standing ovation on my visit). 

Claire Alfree, The Telegraph: Stephen Brackett’s rapid-fire production cleverly recreates both the prism and prison of Usher’s mind, trapped as it is within its own self perpetuating, existentially despairing, and yes, often wantonly self-limiting loop. Moreover, the show makes its points most effectively not through accumulative narrative force but through abstracted one-liners: when a passer-by asks Usher if he has seen Hamilton, he snaps “I’m too poor”. And the long-running Tyler Perry gag may be lost on British audiences, although its point – that black artists get to make money only out of a certain sort of white-approved black drama – hits home nonetheless. Jackson’s score is peppy without being stand-out memorable, although Kyle Ramar Freeman as Usher radiates a deceptively breezy mix of little-boy-lost vulnerability and savage scorn.

Marianka Swain, London Theatre: There may well be some who adhere more to those shows than A Strange Loop, which is sometimes bewildering. But then I was very aware that it wasn’t capturing my own experience, which – god knows – is represented more than enough onstage. There will be many Black, queer audience members who find this a revelation: long-overdue programming progress. Even so, there are definitely universal themes here as well. We can all sympathise with career challenges, with struggles to believe in ourselves or to get our families on board with our dreams, and with the gulf between a sincere desire to change and actually making that leap. The emphasis on mental health feels firmly contemporary.

Adam Bloodworth, City A.M.: It’s filled with cultural references that just won’t land with UK audiences, such as recurring mentions of US actor Tyler Perry, which form a key part of the story. Most Brits don’t know who Tyler Perry is and these references take you out of the story.  Worse, the central meta concept of the ‘strange loop’ of repeating circumstances doesn’t reach the physical, mental or figurative heights that would make this a ground-breaking piece of work, instead feeling like a laboured metaphor for someone who’s stuck in life.

Greg Stewart, Theatre Weekly: This is a new musical that’s practically perfect, and made even more so by a breathtaking central performance from Kyle Ramar Freeman, who reprises the role from Broadway.  Freeman’s tender, soulful, and ultimately powerful portrayal of Usher is the must-see performance of this year. A Strange Loop is a heartfelt and authentic piece of writing about a life where discontentment and self-loathing can perhaps be overcome by refusing to make compromises to an unforgiving world.   

Photo Credit: Marc Brenner

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