{"id":2349042,"date":"2026-03-28T11:04:33","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T11:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2349042"},"modified":"2026-03-28T11:04:33","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T11:04:33","slug":"the-guardian-view-on-new-musicals-sex-drugs-and-song-n-dance-editorial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/the-guardian-view-on-new-musicals-sex-drugs-and-song-n-dance-editorial\/","title":{"rendered":"The Guardian view on new musicals: sex, drugs and song \u2018n\u2019 dance | Editorial"},"content":{"rendered":"

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S<\/span>ingin\u2019 in the Rain it will never be, but Trainspotting the Musical<\/a> is not as improbable as it seems. The yellow-brick road from cult novel to film to blockbuster musical is so well trodden that it was only a matter of time before an all-singing, all-dancing adaptation of Irvine Welsh\u2019s gritty 1993 novel<\/a> about a bunch of heroin addicts in Edinburgh hit London\u2019s West End. Danny Boyle\u2019s 1996 film<\/a>, which celebrated its 30th anniversary last month, had already established Trainspotting as a story with a soundtrack. The musical will have specially written songs too.<\/p>\n

From Oliver! and Les Mis\u00e9rables to Matilda, Wicked and The Devil Wears Prada, many of the biggest hitters in the West End today started out as books. Even the global hit Hamilton was inspired by a hefty 800-page biography<\/a> of the 18th-century American founding father Alexander Hamilton. <\/em>Last autumn, Paddington the Musical<\/a> joined their ranks. A musical version of another hit novel about the 1990s (although published in 2009) \u2013 David Nicholls\u2019s One Day \u2013 opened in Edinburgh this month. The romance between Emma and Dexter might be more typical musical fare than the drug-fuelled antics of Trainspotting\u2019s Renton, Sick Boy and Spud, but that doesn\u2019t mean that the latter don\u2019t belong in a musical. Welsh has revealed<\/a> that this latest incarnation will \u201cbroaden\u201d to include contemporary addictions to mobile phones and the internet.<\/p>\n

An opera about the opioid crisis might seem equally unlikely, but this is the subject of The Galloping Cure<\/a> from John Berry, former artistic director of English National Opera, premiering at this year\u2019s Edinburgh international festival. \u201cIf opera wants to own the zeitgeist in the performing arts then it needs to commission stories that have bigger impact,\u201d Berry said recently, in remarks slightly less widely reported than Timoth\u00e9e Chalamet\u2019s opera snub<\/a>. A form sometimes disdained as elitist actually has more recently chosen some surprising themes \u2013 including the life of Anna Nicole Smith or the Jerry Springer talkshow<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Social realism might seem a bigger ask for such a gloriously daft art form as musicals. But they have often dealt with troubled times, from revolutionary France to Weimar Berlin. Modern hits like Dear Evan Hansen<\/a> address mental health and the dangers of social media. After a post-pandemic musicals boom, David Hare grumbled<\/a> that \u201cthey have become the leylandii of theatre, strangling everything in their path\u201d. Ironically, his 1975 rock romp Teeth \u2019n\u2019 Smiles<\/a> has been revived in London this week. But he has a point, especially regarding the dominance of jukebox musicals (Mamma Mia!) and adaptations.<\/p>\n

Musicals are expensive showboats and rebooting established favourites is a safer bet than an entirely original creation. There are exceptions: the award-winning Six<\/a>, about Henry VIII\u2019s wives, was dreamed up by Cambridge University students and started out at the Edinburgh fringe in 2017.<\/p>\n

Whether an adaptation, a reworking or a new work, musicals can stay in tune with the times. Trainspotting\u2019s Renton is Oliver Twist. Emma and Dexter in One Day are Tony and Maria (West Side Story), but more relatable. No matter how dark the material, musical theatre offers escapism from the horrors of the moment. As Yip Harburg, lyricist of The Wizard of Oz, put it<\/a>: \u201cWords make you think thoughts, music makes you feel a feeling, but a song makes you feel a thought.\u201d Choose songs. Choose joy. Choose musicals.<\/p>\n