Rollercoasters and death may sound like a strange subject for a musical but Ride the Cyclone at Southwark Playhouse spins them into its own brand of jaunty strangeness. Premiering in Canada in 2009 and running off-Broadway in 2015, it has taken almost 15 years for the Jacob Richmond and Brooke Maxwell-penned show to make it to the UK. It begins with a freak rollercoaster accident dispatching six teens to a limbo presided over by the Amazing Karnak (Edward Wu), a mechanical oracle perched inside a fortune-telling booth. Suspended above a compact, adaptable set — a rotating platform and projections flickering at its centre — Wu strikes the perfect balance of ominous overseer and animatronic RuPaul, warming the audience up with cheeky meta-jokes about theatre etiquette.
When the teens arrive, they’re joined by Jane Doe (Grace Galloway), a mysterious girl with no memory and no head, and informed — albeit in riddles — of the rules of a contest in which only one of them will earn a second chance at life. Each must plead their case: Ocean (Baylie Carson), the pro-democracy overachiever with a moral compass; Noel (Damon Gould), the romantic with hopes of living it out in Paris; Mischa (Bartek Kraszewski), the rage-filled rapper with a surprisingly tender underbelly; Ricky (Jack Maverick), the formerly mute comic-book-loving fantasist; and Constance (Robyn Gilbertson), the ‘nicest’ girl in town, who carries more emotional heft than she lets on.
It all sounds pretty dark, but Richmond and Maxwell have created a diverse score that ranges from soaring ballads to auto-tuned rap to space-cat numbers. Although not actually sung through, the frequently back-to-back nature of the songs occasionally tightens the pacing a little too much— entertaining, definitely, but relentless. Still, the numbers flesh out the characters, their backstories, and their hopes for life so deeply that by the end, you’re rooting for every single one to come back. This remains true even with all of the glittery earnestness and the over-enunciated impulse to tell rather than show.
It helps that the cast of Lizzi Gee’s production is outrageously versatile: backflips, character-swaps, dance routines and deadpan comedy all tumble together with infectious energy. The lighting (Tim Deiling), props (Ryan Dawson Laight), and choreographic flourishes (Lizzi Gee) cushion the black-box space into something feverish and joyful.
Ride the Cyclone is, of course, about one thing: being alive. So naturally, even in death, these characters are scrambling for meaning, connection, and redemption — a delightful and devastating paradox that might not be especially nuanced, but is undeniably fun to watch.
