Sting’s new musical is heartfelt but baffling – and what’s with Shaggy?

One might well have imagined that a musical created by Sting, about de-industrialisation in the 80s and a beleaguered shipyard in the north east of England, might have had its first major run in this country. Yet no: The Last Ship played first in Chicago in 2014 and then went to Broadway for a curtailed run, with the common lament being that this very English show might have worked better in, well, England. After more international productions – Salt Lake City, Toronto, Turku in Finland – the ship, with Sting himself aboard and heading the cast, finally docks in one of London’s grandest theatres, yet only for a two-week stay. There are two undeniable truths about this show: it is incredibly heartfelt – and there are way too many songs. Sting’s music, most of it freshly composed for this endeavour, is plangent and beautiful, confidently hopping genres from stirring folk to tender ballad. The trouble is that one can have way too much of a good thing and the daunting list of musical numbers fatally impedes narrative momentum. At nearly three hours long, The Last Ship is in grave danger of picking up the maritime equivalent of a parking fine. The Last Ship has been in dry dock for maintenance work multiple times over the past 12 years, a fact evidenced by the show’s credits. The piece’s new book (a musical’s non-music script) is by Barney Norris, “from a book by Lorne Campbell, based on an original book by John Logan and Brian Yorkey”. That really is at least one book too many and while Norris, a writer of deep emotional honesty and sense of place, belatedly hits a confident stride, we struggle to find a way in initially. There is no dialogue for the first 10 minutes, leaving us to puzzle over a wordless tableau of a family dispute as we try to listen out for clues in song lyrics that are not always fully comprehensible. The musical is set in a shipyard in the north east of England, where Sting grew up (Photo: Nienke de Groot) The picture gradually becomes clear: the shipyard (Sting himself grew up in the shipbuilding town of Wallsend) is about to have its contract taken away by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government. Economic hardship and community desolation beckon, but Sting’s salt-of-the-earth yard foreman Jackie is not the type to give up without a flat cap and a fight. (My favourite exchange arises from a character informing Jackie that “even Rome wasn’t built in a day”. His perfect terse reply? “I wasn’t the foreman on that job.”) In between familiar scenes of stick-it-to-the-Tories-the-union-forever, there’s a returning sailor who abandoned his childhood home – aha, maybe there was a point to that first scene – and childhood sweetheart some 17 years previously. Declan Bennett and Frances McNamee, both with beautiful voices, exchange many impassioned words and Bennett’s Gideon sings the hauntingly sad/angry song “Dead Man’s Boots” about the conflicted legacy of his late father. On opening night, reggae singer Shaggy popped up from time to time wearing a trenchcoat; post-show perusal of the programme revealed that his role was “the Wallsend Ferryman”, for two nights only, but I’m really no clearer as to what that was all about. There is much to admire here, as well as much that needs trimming. If I were Sting, I would allow the talented Norris free rein to fine-tune the story and select the songs with the maximum emotional payload. The Last Ship deserves a decent sojourn at a theatrical port in this country before it sets off for another round-the-world cruise. ‘The Last Ship’ is at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane to 3 October (thelastship-musical.com)