Greatest Days review: Take That musical shines but won't rule the world
Viewers are guaranteed a succession of bangers in this film adaptation of the Take That jukebox musical, even if they occasionally hamstring the narrative.
In the fanciful, tweaked history of TV’s Upstart Crow, the jukebox musical is invented by William Shakespeare, its purpose to, as the Bard explains, “grab the hits and crowbar them in with a wafer-thin pretence of relevance.”
It’s a fairly brazen, self-deprecating wink to the viewer by the sitcom’s creator and writer Ben Elton, whose own West End endeavours did the same with the songs of Queen (We Will Rock You) and Rod Stewart (Tonight’s the Night).
Neither of the above has yet to attempt the leap from stage to screen made by Mamma Mia!, but the premise of the Take That musical Greatest Days (originally entitled The Band on its 2017 theatrical debut, before wiser heads prevailed and it was renamed to highlight one of the group’s beloved chart-toppers) more persuasively lends itself to the conventions of film.
Paediatric nurse Rachel (Aisling Bea) wins an all-expenses-paid trip to see her bygone teenage idols, The Boys, play a reunion concert in Athens, which leads her to tentatively approach old friends about accompanying her.
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Take That’s own story of huge pop stardom, a lengthy parting of the ways and an enormously successful comeback provides a perfect timeframe, as the action jumps back and forth between the 1990s and more modern events.
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The younger Rachel, played Lara McDonnell, finds sanctuary in The Boys’ music to block out an unhappy home life (cue scenes of good-looking lads serenading her from kitchen cupboards as she prepares dinner), while 40-something Rachel tries to get a handle on a clinging partner (Marc Wootton) and his serial marriage proposals, and whether she can reconnect emotionally with the school pals she’s not seen for 25 years.
Those adolescent bonds are put to the test when the four friends reconvene and fly out to Greece, during a madcap couple of days of drunken hi-jinx and heart-to-hearts about the path each has taken since they were last together. Only Heather (Alice Lowe), now a respected fashion designer, seems happy with her lot, but that success, almost inevitably, is tinged with sadness.
At its root, then, director Coky Giedroyc’s feel-good fare is a tale of everyday, ordinary women (Busby Berkeley never staged a song-and-dance number with an easyJet passenger plane as a backdrop) taking stock of their lives and pondering what the future holds.
A fifth member of the once close-knit posse is conspicuous by her absence, and it doesn’t take a super sleuth to figure out what might have happened to her, long before her fate is revealed three-quarters of the way through the film.
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Bea, the nominal star of the piece, is great to watch, a performance sparkling with the dry wit of the standup and TV panel show appearances that first brought her to the public’s attention. Lowe, meanwhile, is also good gag value but with a touch more pathos; however, although her character’s back story is arguably the most intriguing it’s frustratingly under-explored.
Screenwriter Tim Firth (who also wrote the book for the 2003 Madness jukebox musical, Our House) examines how youthful hopes and dreams can be derailed as the adult world encroaches, but occasionally the songs get in the way and hamstring the narrative – that “wafer-thin pretence of relevance” mentioned earlier.
They’re not without their moments, though, and when the elder women share the screen with their younger selves to harmonise on Back For Good only the coldest of hearts will remain unmoved.
Nonetheless, this being a film with the music of Take That at its foundation, viewers are guaranteed a succession of bangers; familiar and enduring hits (Shine, Never Forget, Rule the World) whose anthemic qualities made them shoo-ins for a fresh lease of life on the West End stage in the first place.
It’s easy to be cynical about this, or any other jukebox musical, and there will always be naysayers who’ll dismiss it as a Frankenstein’s monster of an art form, but Greatest Days serves up affectionate and even thought-provoking entertainment, with or without a million love songs.
Greatest Days is released in UK cinemas on Friday 16th June 2023. Check out more of our Film coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on.
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