REVIEW: BAT OUT OF HELL @ THEATRE ROYAL PLYMOUTH

🎭 Bat Out Of Hell

📍  The Lyric, Theatre Royal Plymouth, Royal Parade, Plymouth, Devon, PL1 2TR

🗓 Monday 12th May 2025

⭐️⭐️

ON A HIGHWAY TO NOWHERE

BAT OUT OF HELL thundered into Plymouth with a procession of Harley Davidson motorcycles outside the theatre before the opening night last night, creating a petroleum fuelled atmosphere and a buzz of anticipation for the performance.

Unfortunately the show itself left me feeling utterly conflicted and really at a loss of how many stars to award it. After taking everything into account I have landed on two stars and I will try and coherently explain all my thoughts below.

This production does have positives and this is where I'll start. The cast are exceptional. I cannot praise them enough. The vocals on display were fantastic and I was blown away by Ryan Carter and Georgia Bradshaw in particular. Their rendition of Dead Ringer for Love was, without doubt, one of the strongest vocal performances I have seen all year and was definitely the highlight of the entire evening for me. Carter in particular has a gloriously warming voice which listening to was like recieving a vocal hug and I genuinely smiled every time he started singing.

Glenn Adamson's voice was perfect for the songs, with his version of the titular Bat Out of Hell to close act 1 being my favourite performance of his. There was not a weak link among the cast with Katie Tonkinson, Luke Street, Sharon Sexton and Rob Fowler all displaying epic vocals.

The tightness of the ensemble meant that the execution of the choreography was flawless and really hammered home the talent and professionalism of the cast. Regrettably though the phenominal cast were the only real positive for the show, but even they couldn't save the show from it's low star rating. Indeed it could be said that one of the stars was awarded for the singing and the other for the dancing.

Creatively and technically, BAT OUT OF HELL is not good. Let's start with the book which is abysmal at best. The narrative is completely non-existant and it was clear during interval conversations with other patrons that noone had any idea what was happening. I was surprised to discover that Jim Steinman had written the book, because his songs deserve a lot better than this.

The use of hand held microphones throughout was a weird choice, I can understand them being used for the songs but for the spoken parts they just didn't work. All they achieved was to strip any emotion from the scenes. I didn't like the use of the camera projecting the action onto screens. Again this seemed to remove any meaning from the action, almost seeming as if scenes were being overacted. These both felt like very strange creative decisions.

It's as if the show is not quite sure if it's a musical or a concert and this confusion makes for a rather weird final product. The staging around Paradise by the Dashboard Light was completely absurd and like a strange fever dream which pushed the production more pantomime than musical theatre.

The choreography, although performed brilliantly by the amazing cast, was quite boring and extremely repetative. The set design was just okay and the lighting design was poor and lacklustre. It was as if the lighting was an afterthought, It was completely uninspired, leaving some charaters in darkness whilst chaotically chasing others around the stage.

BAT OUT OF HELL should have been so good but ended up failing in every aspect of the production side. Even with the material being feeble and nonsensical, better production values and a complete reworking of everything could easily result in a much stronger show.

I have to reiterate though how sensational this cast is. It is them alone that save this show from being a total abomination. They are a hundred times better than the production and I would love to see them in other roles in different shows to see them really shine as they are all world class performers.

As ever I encourage you to make up your own mind, and if you're a fan of the music you'll be hard stretched to find them performed better than they are by this cast. If you're more forgiving than me then maybe you'll enjoy other aspects of the production too.

BAT OUT OF HELL continues performances at Theatre Royal Plymouth until Saturday 17th May. Click here for tickets.

Neill Kovacic-Clarke

All views are my own and I pride myself on being honest, fair and free from influence. Theatre is subjective and it is important to remember that all views expressed are just those of one reviewer.  

My ticket for this performance of Bat Out Of Hell was gifted by Theatre Royal Plymouth who invited me to watch the show in exchange for my honest review. The fact that my ticket was gifted played no part in the content of my review or the star rating given. 

CAST LIST:

Glenn Adamson as Strat; Katie Tonkinson as Raven; Rob Fowler as Falco; Sharon Sexton as Sloane; Georgia Bradshaw as Zahara; Ryan Carter as Jagwire; Carla Bertran as Tink; Luke Street as Ledoux; Carly Burns as Valkyrie; Leo Abad as Denim; Peter Camelleri as O'Dessasuite; Joshua Dever as Hoffman; Georgia Iudica-Davies as Liebeshwoosh; Natalie Pilkington as Kwaidan; Harriet Richardson-Cockerline as Spinotti; Sophie-Rose Emery as Scherzzo; Ethan Tanner as Markevitch; James Wilkinson-Jones as Hollander; Beth Woodcock as Vilmos; Reece Duncan as Esquivel; Georgia Holland as Goddesilla; Catherine Saunders as Mordema; Craig Watson as Astroganger; Tom Samuels as Onstage Videographer

RUNNING TIME (approx):

2 hours 25 minutes, including interval

CONTENT WARNINGS:

Very loud music; Strobe lighting; Haze; Smoke; Pyro-flames; Scenes of a sexual nature; Strong language

AGE GUIDANCE:

13+