REVIEW | Tina: The Tina Turner Musical
★★★★
Reviewer - Bronagh
*Disclaimer: Gifted tickets in return for an honest review.
Content warnings: Depictions of domestic violence and abuse are present throughout the performance. The show contains strong language and words of a racially discriminatory nature.
Tina: The Tina Musical promises to tell the ‘untold’ story of Tina Turner, an artist whose musical career has spanned close to seven decades and has produced many hits that we all know and love. We’re a month away from the West End production’s fifth anniversary, it’s clear why this is still a hit amongst theatregoers and comes with the subject’s blessing.
Act One of Tina takes us from her humble childhood in Nutbush, where she is known as Anna Mae Bullock, and where she sings louder than anybody else in the room. Her mother, and then her father, abandon her and she is brought up by her grandmother. Years pass, and she reunites with her mother and sister in St Louis, where she meets Ike Turner. We see Anna Mae evolve into Tina Turner, and her relationship with Ike spirals into a weave of domestic violence, infidelity, and jealousy. Act One ends with Tina leaving Ike after a particularly violent fight.
Act Two takes us to Vegas, where Tina is performing gigs in the evening and doing cleaning jobs during the day. Ike has claimed rights for all the songs that they used to perform together, and no record label wants to sign an ‘ageing black woman’, a shocking but not rare occurrence of the 70s. Following a meeting at Capitol Records, she travels to London for a recording session, where she is rejected once more due to her race. This doesn’t stop Tina, who proves them wrong when she has a hit with What’s Love Got to Do With It? and Capitol beg her to let them sign her. This high then wavers, with the news that Tina’s mother is unwell and Ike has been visiting her in the hospital. Act Two ends with Tina preparing for a momentous concert in Brazil where she performs the much loved The Best.
Kristina Love transforms into Tina and channels her completely. The mannerisms, the dance moves, the gravelly voice – she performs in a way I can only imagine Tina did in the 80s. She brings Tina’s story to life; the abuse she endured, the fight she did not give up on to reach the top and the heartbreak. Love’s passionate performance does Tina justice. Her performance of Nutbush City Limits and Proud Mary for the finale blows the rafters off the Aldwych Theatre and has just about every audience member out of their seats.
Caleb Roberts takes on the tricky role of Ike Turner, Tina’s husband and professional partner. This is a role that symbolises jealousy, violence and at times, charm. Roberts brings the nastiness of the character to life, the jealousy when Tina is steadily becoming more famous. Playing Ike cannot be easy, but Roberts’ performance is exceptional and believable.
I can’t not applaud the supporting cast and ensemble. Without them, the West End would be on its knees, and they deserve so much recognition and more. The supporting cast includes the likes of Roger Davies, Rhonda Graam and Erwin Bach. These three are so important in the story, with Davies believing her and helping her reach the top, Graam managing her and later becoming her sister and Bach, who was sent by a record label to meet her at the airport. The real-life Tina and Erwin have now been married for ten years.
Typically, we do not associate jukebox musicals with domestic abuse. To be fair, unless you know Tina’s story you probably don’t know of her suffering to become the, for use of a better word, an icon that we have in the forefront of our mind’s when we hear the likes of The Best. You maybe don’t know that she is a Buddhist either! We learn so much about Tina, her exposure to violence as a child, her mother and father abandoning her and the turmoil she faced trying to reach her dreams.
Tina: The Tina Turner Musical brings Tina Turner’s story to life respectfully – the abandonment, the discrimination but most of all, one woman’s drive and endurance.
At Aldwych Theatre, currently booking until 03 September 2023.
