Theatre review: Blood Brothers, Edinburgh

REMOVING the music from a well-loved musical should be a move which is bold, risky and doomed to failure but somehow Moving Lights Theatre manage to pull it off successfully with their production of Willy Russell's Blood Brothers.

The reason for their success can be put down to two things - great casting and surefooted, imaginative direction.

The cast were full of energy, with Vanda De Luca as Linda and David West and Andrew Findlater as the titular brothers handling both the childhood versions of their characters and their transformation into adulthood impressively .

Kat Folan's Mrs Lyon provided a fine sketch of a shattered psyche dressed by Laura Ashley. Whilst the character's mental deterioration is written with a broad brush it's tribute to Folan's skills that she managed to imbue the role with as much depth and truth as she did.

At the heart of this production was Jacqueline Hannan's astonishing performance as Mrs Johnston. Hannan completely inhabited the role from her first entrance until the lights went down and there was never a false note in her playing, with every emotion electrifying the audience.

That the actors were able to give such excellent performances is all the more remarkable given the limitations of set, budget and space available to them and all credit goes to director Andrea McKenzie for creating a free-flowing, innovative and imaginative production.

Aside from the music- ectomy the other big change was the transfer of setting from Liverpool to Leith. In truth this added nothing to the show although at least the audience was spared any dodgy Scouse accents.

There was only one flaw in this production and that was the unbalanced nature of the two halves. Originally a three-act play this production broke it into two, one overlong first half and one far too short second, which had the effect of leaving the finale feeling rushed.

Many companies would have played safe with their first production and by stripping away the music they've shown ambition and bravery and have produced something to shout - though probably not sing - about.

Run ends June 18