Will it get your vote? Sylvia makes its full debut at The Old Vic Theatre

“Be the change that you want to see, be the change for you and me”

This is the clarion call for the new UK musical, Sylvia, which tells the story of Sylvia Pankhurst, one of Emmeline Pankhurst’s daughters and her contribution to changing the lives of the working-class men and women.

The production initially began in 2018, but due to complications became labelled more as a ‘workshop’ of the production it is today. Hot of the tails of Hamilton, Sylvia follows a very similar path. It tells the story of a lesser-known part of a well-known story, using a modernised music style of hip-hop, rap, etc. It is perfect for fans of these types of shows and very much adapts itself for the modern audience. It works best at telling the story but explaining it enough that everyone can follow along, no matter how much they know about the topic. A key helpful technique they use is a showing of the year in the background which is very useful as showing how much the time has passed.

The set is extremely well-thought out, as well as the costumes to create a visual story as well as the one being sung. There are projections on the back that emphasise words such as ‘MARCH’ and ‘SUFFRA-JITSU'. These helps project the meanings of the musical numbers and the show altogether. The use of colour is particularly clever. With the costumes being in black and white, representing how the world views at the time were black and white, women couldn’t and shouldn’t vote and that was final. It also represents how Emmeline Pankhurst saw things in a strategic manner. Things had to be a certain way, her way. The use of red to represent Labour and more of a freedom, especially as the show goes on is striking and shows the difference between the two mindsets of Emmeline and Sylvia. As the red bleeds through the show, we see more of Sylvia gaining her own voice. Costumes turn to black at violent and dark moments and turn to white to represent loss.

Sharon Rose stars as Sylvia, leading our show and very rarely leaving the stage. Her vocals are impressive, and she shows the growth of Sylvia throughout the show, especially through the time changes. A key standout moment was her duet stand-off with her mother where she really showed her emotional climax, a moment that had been building up throughout the show. The only issue is that Sylvia is almost too good, there is not enough contrast in her character to keep her an interesting main character. She is stuck in her ways of begging for equality for all and fighting with her family’s values, but she seems almost too pure for a complex audience to follow, except for her problematic relationship with Keir Hardie, which is a slightly disturbing romantic entwinement in the show which could have been handled with a bit more subtlety, for example, not mentioning how they met when she was 7.