Review: Blood Brothers brilliance at Milton Keynes Theatre

I’ve never seen the play before, but this emotional tale of twins separated at birth who are brought up in different social circles but find their way back into each others’ lives simply blew me away. In fact, I’d go as far as saying it’s become my favourite show I’ve seen at the venue in recent years.

Vivienne Carlyle leads the cast as Mrs Johnstone, a character who pops out babies like there’s no tomorrow. Sadly, she gets traded in by her husband for a younger model and she’s left to struggle to look after the family alone – and she’s in for a shock when her doctor tells her twins are on the way.

Faced with the bailiffs knocking at her door, she takes the heartbreaking decision to allow upper class Mrs Lyons (Paula Tappenden), who can’t have children, to bring up one of the babies as she simply can’t afford to raise both.

She works as Mrs Lyons’ cleaner, but gets the boot when her boss decides she’s growing too attached to the baby she agreed to give up (Eddie).

Fast forward to seven years later and, with vastly different upbringings, rough and ready Mickey (Sean Jones) and posh boy Eddie (Danny Knott) meet by chance, unaware they’re siblings, and strike up a strong friendship – declaring themselves ‘blood brothers’.

It was only a couple of weeks ago that I sat through Joseph the Technicolor Dreamcoat at MK Theatre where we had children wearing fake beards playing Joseph’s grown-up brothers. This time it was the reverse with Sean and Danny initially portraying seven-year-olds (then teenagers, and finally adults as their lives moved on). Seeing grown men running around acting as school kids and playing childish games like Cowboys and Indians made for some hilarious moments.

In fact, despite the hugely poignant story, this play was also packed full of both subtle and laugh-out loud humour. A pretty instant switch by Alex Harland from being a strict boarding school teacher disciplining Eddie one moment, to a despondent teacher at Mickey’ public school in the next scene (who told the class swot he was ‘a boring little turd’!), was a case in point. Alex just turned away from the audience, ruffled his hair and he was away, transformation complete!

I won’t go much further into the plot, suffice to say it’s a tragic tale more depressing than EastEnders at times – but that’s not giving much away as the opening scene takes us to the end of the story and then the Narrator (Kristofer Harding) invites us to see how the boys’ lives played out to reach that point.

The musical numbers – which include Bright New Day, Marilyn Monroe and Tell Me It's Not True – drive the plot along nicely, with Kristofer’s expert help when needed. He’s a bit of a looming presence nagging away in the ear of most of the key characters.

I thought Vivienne Carlyle was brilliant as downtrodden Mrs Johnstone, and also Paula Tappenden’s Mrs Lyons was memorable for her growing desperation to keep her ‘son’ on the straight and narrow and trying to ensure the secret about the boys was never discovered.

And take a bow, Sean Jones and Danny Knott. From childish exurberance to downright misery and despondancy in later life, the pair absolutely nailed it with outstanding performances.

Blood Brothers runs until Saturday, August 30 and I can’t recommend it enough. Book your tickets at ATGTICKETS.COM/MiltonKeynes.