Only Fools and Horses, Edinburgh review: 'a rollicking two hours of nostalgic musical escapism'

Only Fools and Horses is a heartfelt tribute to a much-loved television classic that now seems to speak to us from a different world, writes Joyce McMillan

Paul Whitehouse as Grandad in Only Fools and Horses | Johan Persson

Only Fools and Horses, Playhouse, Edinburgh ★★★★

Blast Off, Starburst, Oran Mor ★★★

Any old iron, anyone? No? Well never mind; because what I’ve got here is a lovely jubbly old British sitcom, first seen in 1981, now obligingly transformed - by Jim Sullivan, son of the show’s original creator John Sullivan, and by actor and comedy writer Paul Whitehouse - into a rollicking two hours of nostalgic musical escapism, first seen in London in 2019.

As in the original television series, this stage version of Only Fools and Horses is set in working-class Peckham 40 years ago; although at one point, a look into Trigger’s granny’s crystal ball offers strange glimpses of a future Peckham full of hipster coffee bars, where ordinary terraced houses cost a million quid. Del Boy Trotter is running his market stall as usual, staying just a few steps ahead of the local moneylenders and hard men; and his young half-brother Rodney is moving up in the world, hoping to marry his posh bird, Cassandra, and buy a nice modern flat.

Del, meanwhile, is seeking love through a local dating agency, and secretly scheming to get Rodney the £2,000 flat deposit he needs; while grandad tuts and philosophises from his chair, and local flash-harry Boycie and his wife Marlene are up at the fertility clinic, trying to get pregnant.

All of which, of course, offers a perfect excuse for a witty, affectionate and sometimes moving playlist of 20 songs, most of them original, but augmented by a couple of classics in the shape of Bill Withers’ Lovely Day, and Simply Red’s Holding Back The Years, stunningly sung by Gloria Acquaah-Harrison as Mrs Obooko. The original songs range from a lively opening number in the pub that shades into a chorus of Any Old Iron, through Not Now, Grandad, to the lovely The Girl, sung by Georgina Hagen as Del Boy’s new date Raquel, and Boycie and Marlene’s pensive Tadpole Song, about the pain of childlessness.

Alice Power’s set features powerful projected images of 1980s Peckham, with assorted witty artwork to match the songs; director Caroline Jay Ranger’s choreography is smart, snappy and great fun. And with Sam Lupton and Tom Major on fine form as Del Boy and Rodney, and Whitehouse himself acting and singing his socks off as Grandad, the whole evening offers both a jolly, well-crafted show in itself, and a heartfelt tribute to a much-loved television classic, that now seems to speak to us from a different world.

Megan Lovat and Rebecca Elise in Blast Off, Starburst | Tommy Ga-Ken Wan

There’s something of the same open-hearted spirit about Blast Off, Starburst, this week’s Play, Pie and Pint drama at Oran Mor, in which performer, writer and director Catriona MacLeod explores the experience of bereavement through a three-handed drama featuring Rebecca Elise as Shona, a woman of 30 or so who has just lost her mother, alongside Megan Lovat as Shona’s childhood self, and Sheila Grier as her whisky-loving Aunt Mags.

The play involves a long metaphor based on Shona’s childhood obsession with astrophysics, with the magic of the stars, and with the idea that we are all made of stardust; and we’re invited to contrast young Shona’s huge enthusiasm for a universe which seems full of wonder and meaning - expressed in long conversations with the offstage voice of her single mother, also played by Rebecca Elise - with the disappointment and depression of the older Shona, who can no longer see meaning in anything.

Eventually Mags brings round a parting gift from Shona’s mother that begins to ease her despair, perhaps through the sheer power of love, despite all their mother-daughter tensions. And although MacLeod’s play and production sometimes seem more full of words and talk than they are clear about what they want to convey, Rebecca Elise’s beautiful central performance reveals a real power in the writing, just waiting for a slightly stronger and slimmer structure, to make it truly shine.

Both shows run until 9 November.