Six: the Musical (Grand Opera House until Saturday 15 April)

There isn’t just a president in town. Belfast is also hosting royalty this week in the shape of half a dozen queens, the fabulous women we tend to dismiss by bundling them up as “the wives of Henry VIII”. But having basked in his-story for too many centuries, the women are telling their her-stories in the musical retelling of their lives on the stage of the Grand Opera House.

Six is like a souped-up Horrible Histories megamix, with historical narrative enhanced with fun wordplay, stacks of sass, and innuendo that may – or may not – fly over the head of younger audience members. (There’s an age advisory of 10.) And like the TV show, there’s no attempt to paper over the awkward and uncomfortable realities of these women.

For those like me who weren’t paying that much attention in second year history class when the late and much missed Brian McClinton was rattling through the chronicles of the House of Tudor, the Six cast members quickly fill in the background to the handy rhyme “divorced – beheaded – died – divorced – beheaded – survived”.

Each woman gets to lead a song that reflects their own tale of sorrow, grief, and in two cases, decapitation. The musical styles and personalities vary. What’s initially made out to be a competition to see who has the biggest bundle of woe descends into a more wholesome appreciation of how they have been portrayed and overlooked.

The set and lights create a concert environment, with the cast really only leaving the stage to pick up props. Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss’s smart lyrics and book revel in anachronisms, and gild what is properly a sad story with a brightness that carries the meaning over the memoire.

Tonight’s queens – Chlöe Hart (Catherine of Aragon), Jennifer Caldwell (Anne Boleyn), Casey Al-Shaqsy (Jane Seymour), Jessica Niles (Anna of Cleves) and Rebecca Wickes (Katherine Howard) and Alana M Robinson (Catherine Parr) – were backed by their costumed minstrels, aka the Ladies in Waiting, Laura Browne, Ashley Young, Migdalia Van Der Hoven, and musical director Caitlin Morgan even adding the odd extra vocal here and there.

The green queen, Anne Boleyn (2), gets one of the catchiest songs, Don’t Lose Ur Head, and is played by Caldwell with the cheek of a Spice Girl. Robinson embodies Catherine Parr (6) with a soulful lesson about her sacrifices to survive in a rarefied world where women were at the beck and call of the most powerful man in the court. The production also communicates a strong sense of body positivity, something not always visible in touring musical theatre.

The tour’s cast will be changing at the end of the month. Yet one of the successes of Six’s format is the way new (and alternate) performers can slip in and out of the production – the UK tour travels with a phalanx of swings, at least two of which can cover all six of the wives – matching up with the fixed choreography and melodies, but able to inject some of their own personality and joie de vivre into their role(s). Go back and the see the show in the future, and there’ll be new twists and emphasis.

This is a real crowd-pleaser of a show. Sheer love for the production and familiarity with its lyrics and music – though not the tunes are equally catchy: a couple of queens get a raw deal with their big number – really help bridge the sharp mood change near the end that could leave a less well-regarded show teetering on the cliff age of buzzkill.

I love energy and style of Six. But repeat visits do remind me that dramaturgically even more opportunities could have been taken by the writers to talk about the achievements of some of the queens before, during, and (sometimes) after their marriage to the British monarch. So much of the enjoyable banter is bitchy rather than truly biting. That’s probably asking a lot of an 80-minute show, but if you’re going to dip your toe into the feminist waters, better to jump right in rather than stay at the shallow end.

Six continues its sold out run at the Grand Opera House until Saturday 15 April. But it will surely return: there’s no reason that Six won’t continue to tour for many years to come.

Photo credit: Pamela Raith (note that supplied imagery depicts a slightly different cast line-up)

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