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Mushy: Lyrically Speaking review – smart musical about Educating Yorkshire star

In 2013, Musharaf Asghar became an unlikely star of reality TV. A British-Pakistani pupil on Educating Yorkshire, he was propelled to fame when his teacher, Mr Burton, helped him to overcome his lifelong stammer with a method he had seen in a film about King George VI.

That King’s Speech moment reduced audiences to tears, along with Asghar’s speech at his end-of-year assembly. This musical, staged in 2019, dramatises those struggles with his speech impediment, alongside his relationship with Mr Burton and his single, steely-willed Mirpuri mother.

That golden TV moment does not translate into musical theatre with nearly the same emotional punch, but Mushy: Lyrically Speaking is a smart and touching show nonetheless, opening with a storming first hour of energetic song and drama.

Co-produced by Rifco theatre company and Watford Palace theatre, the show has songs by the rapper Raxstar that burst with an irreverent spark. “Just piss off,” Mushy sings at his jeering bullies: “There’s a mask on my face that I want to rip off.”

There is a hugely compelling central performance from Varun Raj as Mushy, while Oliver Longstaff as Mr Burton and Medhavi Patel as Mushy’s mother, Ammi, are both spirited. Under Ameet Chana’s resourceful direction, the latter two double up in a variety of roles and give the impression of a bigger cast.

Eleanor Bull’s set is delightfully minimalist in its versatility: an initial backwall of school lockers switches from the classroom to Mushy’s home, the blackboard revolving to become a living-room cabinet, and then the cabinet revolving again to become the door of the boy’s toilets at school.

These elements create dynamism in the first half, but the momentum flags by the second hour. Pravesh Kumar’s book begins to focus on the after-effects of Mushy’s TV fame, with all its shallow glories and inspirational speeches. The musical astutely shows that his fame is not a panacea for his problems, but too many scenes make the same point, and the arc of the story seems to stall.

There is also drama around Ammi’s immigrant experience, but it is bluntly delivered at times, with jokes that repeat cultural cliches – of Asian parents forcing their children to be doctors and furniture being wrapped in plastic. These sound tired and overfamiliar, even if they are knowing.

The pace slows as a result, and there are not enough songs in the second half. But despite this, there are pleasures in this musical, and the mother and son relationship is sensitively rendered. One outstanding scene towards the end shows Mushy praying alongside his mother, and it is both moving and eloquent in its silence.