REVIEW: BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF at Richmond Theatre, 11-15 February and on tour

“Are you sure your wife’s not working? Not even a little bit of cleaning on the side?” Social security official in Boys from the Blackstuff 

★★★★

Alan Bleasdale’s 1982 five-episode television series BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF has been adapted for the stage by James Graham. I caught it at the start of its tour, at the charming but unadventurous Richmond Theatre on Richmond Green.

When a famous TV show is adapted for the stage, we should judge it as though it was an original theatre piece with no previous life. Otherwise, we encourage the commercial theatre down the tempting and well-trodden path of drawing in audiences on name recognition alone, which has led to some lamentable west end productions. 

This is not one of them. Boys from the Blackstuff as a stage play is a strong and shocking piece of social commentary. 

Five young men from Liverpool 8 – the city’s poorest and roughest district – set out to make a living during the 1980s, mostly building roads – tarmac is ‘the blackstuff’. They meet a world where unemployment and poverty are being consciously used by the Thatcher government as a weapon to keep the working class in its place. The system grinds them down. We feel their pain and their anger.

And we understand why they reject our well-meant middle-class solutions. Should they get the union in? No, the union will only stop their cash-in-hand payments, which, on the rare occasions that they have work, enable them to keep their meagre wages out of the hands of the taxman. What about politics? “I can’t feed my kids on principles and ideology. I need money.”

We watch in horror as Yosser trails his children around after him in his desperate search for a job. “I can do that. Gissa job.” Yosser’s gauche approaches do not help him in his job search, but who decided that only the smoothly adept networkers among us should be permitted to feed their children? 

The talented and intelligent actor Jay Johnson as Yosser leads a fine ensemble cast, performing in front of an interesting if slightly over-elaborate set by Amy Jane Cook. 

I saw the show with my friend Mike, who like me is easily old enough to have been at work in the eighties, and perhaps saw more of the harsh side of work than I did, for he whispered as we left our seats: “That’s just how it was.” Over a pint at the nearby Sun pub (much to be recommended, especially if you’re a rugger fan), he told me about an older man than us, from the north east, “a really intelligent man, a proud man, and he’d applied for 500 jobs and didn’t get any of them.” 

Those who persist in seeing Margaret Thatcher as some sort of saviour should watch Boys from the Blackstuff. Perhaps they will remain convinced that this sort of heartless and cruel treatment of our poorest citizens is somehow good for our national soul. For me, the loathing I felt at the time for Thatcher and all her works came flooding back in one evening at the Richmond Theatre. 

Photography: Alastair Muir

Bill Kenwright Ltd presents the

Liverpool’s Royal Court and National Theatre production of

Alan Bleasdale’s BOYS FROM THE BLACKSTUFF by James Graham

Richmond Theatre 11-15 February 2025

BOX OFFICE

UK Tour now on sale

29 January - 28 June 2025

Full details

CREATIVES

Directed by Kate Wasserberg 

Set & Costume Design Amy Jane Cook 

Lighting Design Ian Scott 

Movement Direction Rachael Nanyonjo

Original Music & Sound Design Dyfan Jones

Video Design Jamie Jenkin

Fight Direction Rachel Bown-Williams of Rc-Annie Ltd

Associate Director Tim Welton

CAST

GEORGE CAPLE (CHRISSIE)

JURELL CARTER (LOGGO)

JAY JOHNSON (YOSSER)

GED MCKENNA (GEORGE)

MARK WOMACK (DIXIE)

REISS BARBER (SNOWY)

AMBER BLEASE (ANGIE) 

KYLE HARRISON-POPE (KEVIN)

SEAN KINGLSEY (MALLOY)

JAMIE PEACOCK (MOSS)

SIAN POLHILL-THOMAS (MS SUTCLIFFE)

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