Just for One Day review — on stage and off, Geldof goes on the attack
How did Bob Geldof corral the world's biggest pop stars into making first Band Aid and then Live Aid happen? Seeing the real Sir Bob speak to the gala night crowd at the Shaftesbury Theatre at opening night made it all come into focus even more keenly than the sometimes powerful, sometimes goofy, sometimes earnest musical about the events of 1984 and 1985 that preceded it.
Geldof was electric. His hair white yet shaggy, his clobber casual yet sharp, he first saluted the show itself for its essential accuracy, never mind his character being some 'cartoon arsehole … just saying 'f***', basically'.
The actor Craige Els, who plays Geldof, is actually one of the show's big successes, stalking around all night in double denim with a hangdog expression and a can-do attitude. He's so good you almost forget he's not actually Bob Geldof.
Oh, until the real thing comes on to enthuse about how the 10 per cent cut the Band Aid charity gets from ticket prices has already raised almost £1 million. And then moves on to attack the American president's decision to remove funding for USAid on February 1, claiming that since then '300,000 people have died because of Musk, because of Trump, because of Vance'. He chided Keir Starmer for cutting Britain's foreign aid budget too.
'But mainly,' he added, 'this is the most fun in the West End you're ever going to have.'
On that point, let's quibble. Not because Just for One Day is a horror — this larky-cum-lyrical reinvention of Geldof and co's incredible achievements is tighter than it was when it opened last year at the Old Vic, and features some breathtaking moments of music.
Yet it's at least as frustrating as it is inspiring. It's neither a straight jukebox retelling — much though it is fuelled by dozens of the songs played in London and Philadelphia on July 13, 1985 — nor quite its own thing, much though it presents everything through a modern prism. A young character, Jemma, notes the surfeit of white straight males on stage at Live Aid, but they are in the minority on stage at the Live Aid musical.
It's all retold by Suzanne, who was at Wembley as an 18-year-old. Her 18-year-old, Jemma, is up for hearing mum's memories, dubious of the lyrics of Do They Know It's Christmas. Geldof puts paid to such 'white saviour' quibbles so swiftly it was barely worth raising them.
Indeed, there is a simpler, probably better version of this show that just gets on with biffing out the hits of that day loud and proud and in period style. After all, the six-piece band on the riser upstage are as tremendous as Geldof (the real one) says they are.
But no: like some theatrical Red Nose Day, Luke Sheppard's production and John O'Farrell's script are a bumpy blend of some funny routines, some unfunny routines and some strenuously serious routines.
Geldof is a great impression, George Ure (no relation) is a lifelike Midge Ure, and Julie Atherton excels as a twin-set-and-pearly-wearing Margaret Thatcher, bursting into Elton John's I'm Still Standing. Beyond that, though, verisimilitude is verboten. The large multitasking chorus play the real-life characters in their own voices and sing the song extracts (really well) their own way. Fine, but when it's so bitty there is little time for the music to build up a head of steam, to feel better than second-hand.
When it does — on an extended version of Message in a Bottle or My Generation, say, or when the Queen songs get the most out of the massed chorus of voices — it can take your breath away. Shame a rock musical doesn't trust more in the power of rock.
★★★☆☆
150min
Shaftesbury Theatre, London, to Jan 10,
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