Theatre reviews: Crocodile Rock | The Karate Kid - The Musical

Crocodile Rock, Oran Mor, Glasgow ★★★★

The Karate Kid, Festival Theatre, Edinburgh ★★★

Growing up gay in 1980s Millport was never likely to be easy for young Steven, the hero of Andy McGregor’s acclaimed 2019 solo musical Crocodile Rock. With a macho pub landlord of a Dad - and a generation of classmates for whom “filthy poof” is the ultimate insult - Steven undergoes one ordeal after another, during his teenage years, as he is mocked by his father’s friends about his lack of interest in girls and football, rejected with horror by the boy who is his first crush, and beaten up on Millport beach - where, as he dolefully observes, the main tourist attraction is a rock that someone has painted to look like a crocodile.

What’s striking about Crocodile Rock, though, is the fact that this familiar tale of gloom is anything but unrelieved, thanks to the intense, witty energy and sparkle of Steven’s own personality - as evoked in Darren Brownlie’s terrific performance - and the vividness with which McGregor’s text and songs conjure up the various moments of joy and understanding that mark Steven’s long journey towards a place where he can be himself.

Now, Crocodile Rock is revived as the final show of the current Play, Pie and Pint season, before an August run at the Edinburgh Fringe; and Brownlie’s performance, and McGregor’s beautiful and touching playlist of songs, shine as brightly as ever, as Steven finally pulls on a sparkly dress and over-the-top blonde wig, and shimmies off into a fabulous future in Glasgow.

The sheer theatrical skill, range and versatility Darren Brownlie brings to the role is a joy to experience, as he evokes the story’s whole range of characters. And if the conclusion is a shade too shouty and triumphal in its suggestion that Steven has solved all his problems by finding the courage to go out wearing a dress, it still offers a memorable and gorgeous feel-good moment to everyone who values the greater love and acceptance for LBGTQ people that is now enshrined in law across much of the western world; and who wants to protect those gains, from the new threats they now face.

The Festival Theatre in Edinburgh, meanwhile, plays host to another show about a teenage boy confronting toxic ideas about masculinity, in The Karate Kid - The Musical, based on the 1984 Hollywood film. Inspired by the real life story of the film’s original writer, Robert Mark Kamen - who also, almost 40 years on, wrote the book for this 2022 musical - The Karate Kid tells the story of Daniel, a teenager from New Jersey who moves to California with his widowed mother, only to encounter serious bullying and snobbery from a group of classmates trained up in a brutal and aggressive form of karate known as Cobra Kai - particularly when he starts a tentative relationship with the ex-girlfriend of the group’s violent leader.

Like Steven, though, he is saved both by the love of his mother, and by the influence of a very different male mentor in the unlikely shape of maintenance man Mr Miyagi, who - it gradually emerges - is a wise and gifted karate master. This 2020s musical version of the story - with a 16-song playlist by Drew Gasparini - slightly smooths out the original narrative, towards a fairly standard 21st century tale of individual triumph against the odds; and the music is largely unmemorable.

READ MORE: Theatre reviews: Crocodile Rock | The Karate Kid - The Musical

Given a pair of touching central performances from Gino Ochello as Daniel and Adrian Pang as Mr Miyagi, though, the show offers a thoroughly effective and good-looking two and a half hours of entertainment; and it was received with rapture in Edinburgh by a young audience full of karate enthusiasts who seemed more than happy to take a trip back to the 1980s, and to the founding moment of the whole Karate Kid story.

Crocodile Rock is at Oran Mor, Glasgow, until 27 June, and at the Gilded Balloon, Edinburgh, 5-31 August. The Karate Kid is at the Festival Theatre, Edinburgh, until 27 June, and at the Theatre Royal, Glasgow, from 30 June until 4 July.

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