Perfectly Ordinary A New Musical

Perfectly Ordinary is a brand new British musical at the Hope Mill Theatre! It is an in depth study about how we view mental health ,which is a huge topic nowadays but I haven’t seen anything that draws the curtain back in a hospital ward, where we meet 7 different characters with their own stories…

This production strips everything back and it totally proves that if the material is strong enough then you don’t need flashy sets and costumes. The set that there worked very well with just LED strip lights lining the stage and doorway. Around the stage there was medicine containers that lit up which looked beautiful.(Set design by Frankie Gerrard) They used this very well to add edge and colour to the manly monochrome lighting.

Book and Lyrics are by Matthew Rankcom and he provides the realism to each of these characters stories, his lyrics flow beautifully and were crafted well. Music is by Joe Wilson which heightens the emotion in powerful style. There was just one keyboard playing his intricate pretty music. The strong cast of 7 deliver the material strongly with powerful vocal harmonies and grounded acting. The characters include 1 nurse and 6 patients that are all 3 dimensional humans. I enjoyed the different stories and motivations the characters had.

Two directors (Samantha Dye and Matthew Rankcom) stitched this together very effectively with some really beautiful moments sprinkled throughout. This brand new musical has a lot of potential so I hope it has a lot more life to develop! I love theatre that makes you think and this certainly does, it revealed so much to me that I never knew.

Thanks for reading!

Eugene