Margaret Thatcher: Queen of Hollywood ⭐⭐⭐⭐
“Lights! Cameras! Maggie! Mrs Thatcher goes to Hollywood to play herself in a musical remake of the Iron Lady and a Prime MiniSTAR is born! Will Maggie pull herself up by her bra straps or be trampled down by the man? And will she find a moment to ugly-cry so she can win an Oscar?”
Margaret Thatcher: Queen of Hollywood absolutely understands the assignment. This is camp, ridiculous, gloriously theatrical and packed with enough jokes to make you wonder whether Maggie ever actually had a chance.
Direction is lovely and clear, and I genuinely appreciated how confidently it knows what it wants to do. There is never any real confusion about the mood or where the production is heading, and the space is used extremely effectively. Everything feels deliberate without becoming overcomplicated.
Choreography is good and, crucially, never overshadows the performances. It is always present and contributes to the show's theatricality, but it never feels as though the production is dancing simply because it has a musical number.
The set is absolutely gorgeous. The glittery mound with Maggiewood emblazoned across it is immediately ridiculous in precisely the right way. It creates the perfect Hollywood-meets-Westminster world. It adds another layer to the production’s Hollywood aesthetic and gives the performers another way to play with the audience.
Costume has gone all out, and it shows. Everything looks incredible. The additional costume elements are particularly hilarious and add so much to the various characters. But Margaret Thatcher’s costumes are the real stars. They are extravagant, detailed, and absolutely do not look like they came from a Fringe budget. I hugely appreciated the level of commitment here.
LX is brilliant. I particularly loved the old-style tripod lights around the back wall of the set, while the moving lights hidden within the glittery mound add an enormous amount to the overall atmosphere. There are so many states, and they remain dynamic and fresh throughout. The lighting genuinely elevates the production and gives it a scale far beyond what the venue might suggest. Sound is similarly strong. The production has a clear sonic identity and uses sound to keep the energy elevated without overpowering the performers. It feels like a fully realised musical rather than a Fringe show that happens to contain songs.
The book by Matt Tedford, Jon Brittain, and Tasha Dhanraj is hilarious and incredibly well written. The pacing is tight without ever feeling rushed, and there are seemingly endless jokes. There are certainly enough jokes that your brain barely gets time to recover before the next one arrives. Most importantly, the writing never takes itself too seriously. It knows exactly how ridiculous the premise is and commits to it completely. The result is a script that feels intelligent without ever becoming smug. The music and lyrics are just as funny and witty. There is some wonderfully clever wordplay, and several of the songs are extremely catchy. The score understands that a parody musical still needs to be a good musical, and genuine craft lies beneath the comedy.
The performances by Matt Tedford, Kathy Maniura and Rosalie Minnitt are excellent. The company fully commit to the heightened world. There is a wonderful understanding of camp, parody and musical theatre, but nobody plays the joke at the expense of the character. The central performance by Tedford as Thatcher is particularly strong, finding the comedy in the character while still giving her enough presence to carry the show. And they are just so fast and witty with the audience comebacks where needed that make it such an enjoyable evening.
The ensemble (Kathy Maniura and Rosalie Minnitt) also deserves huge credit for the devotion to the various characters and costume transformations. There is a real sense that everyone is having fun. And the clarity in the characterisations is just perfection, and they have some really fast costume changes that make you wonder how they pulled that off.
Margaret Thatcher: Queen of Hollywood is exactly the Fringe musical I want to see. It is camp without being lazy, political without becoming a lecture and ridiculous without losing sight of the fact that it still needs to be good theatre. The production looks fantastic, the writing is consistently funny, the score is catchy, and the performances are full of personality. And somewhere between the glitter, the cameras, the drag and the bra straps, Margaret Thatcher has become a Hollywood star. I’m still not entirely sure how. But I’m very glad she did.
Margret Theatcher: Queen of Hollywood plays at Assembly George Square Gradens in the Piccolo Tent at 8:40 pm and runs for approximately 65 minutes.
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