Parking Spot: The Musical! at Greenside @ George Street Review
Will has just bought his first car at 33, and there is nowhere to put it, until the private spot of a beloved retired mailman opens up on his Jersey City block and four neighbours declare quiet,petty, all-consuming war. From that premise, writer Louis Armistead and composers Erick Eiser and Dash Hammerstein have built one of the funniest new musicals at this year's Fringe, played to a deservedly packed house.
The staging could not be more stripped back - a minimal set, no backing tracks, just a keyboard live on stage. From the opening number, every character arrives fully formed: within ten minutes we know exactly who these people are, what they want, and precisely how badly they're prepared to behave to get it. That's the mark of a genuinely well-crafted book and score, and it means the comedy never has to stop for exposition.
Harris Solomon is a comic standout as Will, radiating an Andy Samberg-esque charm - hapless, hopeful, and impeccably timed. He's matched beat for beat by Lila K. Smith as Heather, who is both a standout comedian and a true vocal powerhouse; the Lime Studio feels several sizes too small for her. It's a very funny script made funnier still by a cast who know exactly what to do with it, and under JuJu Jaworski's direction the energy never flags - there's none of the mid-hour sag that afflicts so many Fringe musicals. Fifty-five minutes fly past at the speed of someone reversing into a space before you can get there.
If there's a note, it's one of ambition rather than complaint: this show has outgrown its own modesty. The vocals deserve mics, the score deserves fully realised arrangements, and the material could comfortably sustain a two-act life beyond the Fringe. That a brand-new, fully original musical comedy arrives this polished and still leaves you wanting a bigger version of it is about the best problem a premiere can have.
Petty, joyful, and impossible not to hum on the way out. Get there early - like the spot itself, seats are going fast.
Parking Spot: The Musical! runs at Lime Studio, Greenside @ George Street until 22 August.
★★★★★
Written by Ellora for Theatre and Tonic, August 2026.