While the millennia-old union between planet Earth and humanity might not be the first coupling that springs to mind when you think of unhealthy relationships, there’s no denying it is pretty toxic. The Earth gives! Humanity takes! The Earth had boundaries, and humanity violated ‘em – first digging up the ground to mine for coal and drill for oil, then jetting into space with a wandering eye, pushing the atmosphere to its limits in a bid to see what else was out there.
It’s safe to say we’ve put our hosting planet through the wringer physically, but what if we’ve left it feeling emotionally drained too? Could the climate crisis with its ruinous wild fires and unforgiving floods be a scorned Earth’s way of telling humanity to do one? It’s a theory! Or at least, it’s the premise of this pop musical romcom from Ellie Coote (book) and Jack Godfrey’s (music and lyrics), the duo who scored a hit last year with 42 Balloons.
Earth and Humanity (aka Hu) are personified as a couple and under this guise, their entire, increasingly troubling partnership is explored. Over the course of one breathless hour of back-to-back songs, the big breakthroughs of our species are reframed as our rocking what could have been a peaceful, happy relationship.
It’s a kooky concept, but this two-hander holds up surprisingly well in a production which Coote also directs, largely thanks to Danielle Steers (Earth) and Tobias Turley (Humanity) being cracking vocalists with a believable chemistry sizzling between them. Through catchy songs stuffed with incisive lyrics, the show follows their relationship through the milestones.
We first find Earth as a ‘strong independent planet’, still vaguely mourning her relationship with the dinosaurs but ready to go on her first date in 66 million years. Hu is a conniving charmer in search of a home, who convinces her they’re a good fit. And at first they become something of a power couple, inventing the windmill and more types of apple than you or I could name. But Humanity grows neglectful and soon, Earth finds herself offering up more of her precious resources than she’s comfortably able to give in order to keep her restless partner interested. Each of her sacrifices is rewarded with caresses and cheesy lines (‘you’re my whole world!’) from Hu. But they don’t last, and with his loud and fast inventions increasingly making her bristle, well, we know where this story is going, don’t we?
At 65 minutes, it’s short and sweet, but I’d say it still feels like an early iteration of a show that could grow with time (it was a hit at this summer’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, where about an hour is the optimal running time). The songs are absolutely there – and are packed with humour and sharp commentary – but were the narrative between them to be more fleshed out, weaving in more nuggets about humanity’s disastrous impact on Earth, this could be a pseudo-educational musical to rival Tudor wives avenger Six.
But a toxic relationship is a clever lens through which to explore humanity’s self-serving greed, and framing the climate emergency as a romcom musical is nothing short of inspired.
