Grooving with the girls

GirlsNight

Most playwrights don’t gamble their life savings on their first play but that is exactly what Louise Roche did when she created Girls’ Night.

“When we first did it we put it on with our mates in a 100 seat theatre and it sold out every night,” recalls Louise.

“The reaction was amazing and then we decided to put on in Milton Keynes Theatre, which is 1400 seats, and we had the deposit of £500, but we had to take 10 grand which we just didn’t have.

“So I spent the next six weeks going round with my three kids in the buggy, and a load of leaflets, but we sold out the whole place which was the start of it.”

The hunch she had a hit was correct as Girls’ Night is now a worldwide sensation playing in America for the last three years, New Zealand and – bizarrely – South Korea.

“It’s about five women on a girls’ night out in karaoke club and they’ve been friends since school, but one of them is dead. So she’s a slightly bitter angel who narrates the whole piece, but I did write it before Desperate Housewives.”

Now this feelgood juggernaut comes to the City Varieties featuring a stellar case including a Casualty stalwart, a Bad Girl and a bona fide soap legend in Gillian Taylforth who played the much put upon Kathy Beale/Mitchell in cockney misery fest Eastenders.

“It is a quality cast and we worked with Gillian on another project, and big star that she is we were doing a fundraiser for teenage cancer, and she came and did it in a very small theatre. She wouldn’t take any money, because she believed in it and that is how we met her.

“We asked if she’d be interested in Girls’ Night and then we met her sister Kim who was in Bad Girls. but originally had been a singer.

“Gillian does a really, really good job and sings in it. I went to watch it the other night and one of things about Eastenders, and especially her character, there was always some problem and she was always worried. In this production she is just smiling all the time and she is so beautiful, she just looks amazing.”

But it’s not one woman show particularly with former Casualty receptionist and jazz singer Rebecca Wheatley in the cast.

“We’d worked with Rebecca on another show called Big Pants and Bottox which came to City Varieties. She sings a song that not many people know, which is one of favourites, called The Love of My Man which is a really soulful song and a real stand out moment.

“Kerrie Enright was in Sister Act in the West End and she has a thundering voice, and Lizzie Francis who plays the Angel is just brilliant.”

But at the heart of the play is the karaoke classics the women perform like I’m Every Woman, Dancing Queen and It’s Raining Men which really drives the plot along.

“To be honest they are the songs of my teenage years and when I came to write it someone told me to only do something you’d like to go and see yourself. So I did actually start with the songs I’d like to hear, and then built the story round them.

“Each song is not just there because it’s good it does have some place in the story. So with one of the characters we have a flashback to her at school finding out her Dad has just left. She didn’t know where he is because her parents were divorcing, and after that she sings I Will Survive.”

So is Girls’ Night just chick lit live then?

“It’s mostly women, but we do get men coming along, and they say they’ve learnt a lot about what women do on a girls’ night out and the things we talk about.

“It’s not about grand themes and more about what women face on a daily basis, dealing with our marriages, relationships, health, but it’s done in a fun way. A lot of women have a laugh, a singsong and then just get on with it.

“Wherever you go people identify with the characters, with the situations in these women’s lives and they love the songs. I’ve never been to a show when they haven’t been up on their feet at the end singing and dancing.”

• Girls’ Night is at City Varieties Music Hall from Monday 25th to Saturday 30th June. Tickets are priced from £15 to £22.50 with group discounts available.
To book call box office 0113 2430808 or visit cityvarieties.co.uk.