If section 28 holds no meaning for you, you were probably not part of a generation for whom it became a focus of battle against establishment homophobia. Or it may just as well be because you were living under it. Because the 1988 Local Government Act essentially decreed that councils and schools kept silent on homosexuality and enshrined in law a refusal to acknowledge gay and lesbian existence as normal.
This fizzing, fiery musical tells the story of that legislation and how its effect brought shame, secrecy, loneliness, trauma and abuse on those growing up gay under it.
Written by Ellice Stevens (who also performs) and Billy Barrett (who directs), the production begins with the Danish children’s book, Jenny Lives With Eric and Martin, about a family with two dads that sparked public outcry in the early 1980s. That unspools to nationwide protests against teaching children about same-sex relationships, outrage in parliament, the misinformation that Aids is a “gay disease”, open hate speech and book burnings. Some of it looks and sounds absurd and some of it is terrifying.
The moral panic about children, and the fear of their corruption or abuse, sits at the centre of the firestorm. Echoes with today’s debates around sexuality and gender reverberate. The show’s biggest emotional force is carried in individual verbatim accounts, from stories of church-based conversion therapy to the double life of a closeted lesbian PE teacher and the desperately lonely sexual desire of a teenager who knows he is gay but has no idea what gay sex is.
There is heroism from lesbian activists who abseil into the House of Lords chamber and invade a BBC newsroom to interrupt a bulletin. Sparkling satire comes in one terrific scene in which Margaret Thatcher emerges like a drag act in big wig and electric blue mini dress to speak against the dangers of homosexuality at a Tory party conference.
Musical director Frew’s fabulous electronica sends us back to a 1980s synthesised clubland while Lizzy Leech’s set design resembles a mini Pacha or G-A-Y nightclub, with kinetic video projections (designed by Zakk Hein) across screens mixed with archive footage and newspapers screaming garish, openly homophobic headlines. Lyrics hit sharp, intelligent notes while the songs are said-sung in a similar style to that of Pet Shop Boys, all against a rousing house beat.
The cast of four, completed by Tika Mu’tamir, EM Williams and Zachary Willis, give wonderful performances, although their voices occasionally falter and the choreography (by Sung Im Her) dips to bagginess and repetition.
The shorter second act brings us up to 2023 with suddenly preachy polemics and analogies made between homophobic prejudice then and trans prejudice today. It is not needed – the unspoken parallels of the first half are far more powerful and this feels rather too untextured and tacked on.
Nevertheless, this musical feels exceptional. That it creates such a compelling narrative around a legal clause, and keeps us captive in enacting debates on its subclauses, is a massive achievement alone.
• At New Diorama theatre, London, until 1 April
