Showcase 2025 – I See Stars
★★★★☆ Sheer entertainment
Church Hill Theatre: Tues 23 – Sat 27 Sept 2025
Review by Hugh Simpson
It is easy to take Showcase for granted year after year, mainly because it consistently produces a show that is crammed full of talented performers, cleverly chosen material and well-drilled performances. In this regard Showcase 2025 – I See Stars is no exception, being yet another feast.
The annual production that raises money for Macmillan Cancer Support (over £369 000 since 1991) boasts a cast of nearly 50, a 15-strong orchestra crammed into the Church Hill pit, and an eclectic selection of music drawn from stage, screen and the charts of yesteryear and more recent times.
Lewis Boyd and the cast of Showcase 2025 – I See Stars. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
Returning production team Andy Johnston (director), David MacFarlane (musical director) and Claire Smith (choreographer) manage somehow to make a coherent spectacle every year, with carefully chosen songs, excellent arrangements and choreography that makes light of a massive crowd on stage of varying dancing abilities.
As indicated by other entertainments featuring a variety of musical sources, the line between musicals, films and pop standards has become distinctly blurred by the advent of the jukebox musical (which often themselves become movies).
suitably up-tempo
So an opening selection billed as a medley from & Juliet is, as those familiar with the show will be aware, a selection of songs co-written by Max Martin originally made famous by the Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. Featuring Lewis Boyd, Hannah Lomas and the chorus, this is a suitably up-tempo, full-on start to proceedings.
There then follows a hugely diverse selection in terms of mood and pace, with chorus numbers alternating with more intimate solos or duets (which often give just enough time for the constant costume changes). Throughout, McFarlane’s band are wonderfully together and consistently melodic, with the balance between instruments and vocals notably good.
Jemma Farnham and Emily Christopher (in pink dress) and the company of Showcase 2025 – I See Stars. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
There are far too many featured performers to do them all justice at any length in a review of any less than 2 000 words; suffice it to say that the standard throughout is extremely high.
Some of the highlights include Kym Brydon and Ruth Cowie’s heartfelt duet on No More Tears (Enough is Enough), Lewis Boyd’s energetic (not to say acrobatic) Rock DJ, Heather Gore’s understated Drive, Ellie Moran’s assertive Don’t Rain On My Parade, Clara Ashing’s assured Time Heals Everything and Jacqui Mills’s quietly defiant Pink Pony Club.
no weak links
There are really no weak links in the performances, however. The 70s classics section also features Amy Totty, Laurence Aitken and Claire Clayton, with the stage seeming more packed than ever on an Abba medley.
The featured dancers in Showcase 2025 – I See Stars. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
A showtune sequence also gives solo time to Laura Cross, Laura Murray, Lynsey Bailey, Craig Young, Matt Fullerton, Kirsty De Luca, Sara Whelan, Jude Edie, Arlene Tonner, John Whelan, Ava Smith, Revathi Eswaran, Ross MacTaggart, David Mack and Dennis Harley, as well as some of those already mentioned.
Once again, there is an elegant balance struck here between the familiar (Queen’s Somebody To Love) and the less well-known (the song from Mean Girls that gives the production its title).
baffling
Perhaps this section is one of the few times where the production is guilty of trying to do a little too much. The attempt to tell the whole story of Blood Brothers in under ten minutes would surely just be baffling to anyone not already familiar with it.
Similarly, One Day More from Les Miserables is a favourite ‘end of the first act’ number, and is very well sung, but – once again – if you don’t know who the various characters are and the precise situation, it is very difficult to understand what is happening.
The Blood Brothers scene in Showcase 2025 – I See Stars, with band members visible in the pit. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
The selection of recent chart hits features Fullerton, Mills, Mack and Louise Chambers, while the movies sequence showcases Fullerton, Smith, Gore, Boyd, Moran, Jennifer McIntosh, Jemma Farnham and Emily Christopher. I Sing The Body Electric from Fame (another pleasingly left-field choice) is one of Smith’s best pieces of choreography, with the featured dancers excellent as they are throughout the whole show.
The section looking back 40 years to Live Aid strikes an odd note at times; shorn of their context, perhaps some of the songs are not as strong as the others in the evening, and I’m not sure anyone needs yet another run through Bohemian Rhapsody (although it is one of those useful numbers that you can seemingly cut randomly and it will still make just as much sense). The various songs are, however, performed with conviction by Andy McGarry, Ross MacTaggart, Gore and Harley.
added significance
The finale sequence is faultless. MacTaggart’s leading of Showcase theme song Love & Mercy is given added significance by the recent death of Brian Wilson, something also commemorated by Craig Young’s rendition of God Only Knows. This is a particularly fine performance; McFarlane’s arrangement of a notably complex piece of music is absolutely outstanding, while Young very much makes the song his own.
Craig Young performing God Only Knows in Showcase 2025 – I See Stars. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
Further pathos comes from the song leading on from Black Sabbath’s ballad Changes in tribute to Ozzy Osbourne. This is not the only nod to Osbourne – the overture is a very pleasing version of Paranoid (the second act overture is a version of that most evocative piece of music, the Theme from Black Beauty).
The obvious joy that the cast display during the bows and their accompanying Beach Boys/Deacon Blue mash-up goes a long way to demonstrating how a show that is the best part of three hours with no narrative thread flies by when it could so easily drag.
Johnston’s direction (not to mention his lighting design) is impeccable, the musical backing is outstanding, the choreography often astonishing, and it all seems so fresh every year. Plus it is all in aid of a good cause.
Running time: Two hours and 40 minutes (including one interval).
Church Hill Theatre, 33 Morningside Rd, EH10 4DR.
Tuesday 23 – Saturday 27 September 2025.
Evenings at 7.30 pm; Matinee Sat 2.30 pm.
Tickets: email: boxoffice@showcase-edinburgh.co.uk from cast members or Book here.
Showcase links:
Website: https://showcase-edinburgh.co.uk/
Facebook: @ShowcaseEdin
Instagram: @showcaseedin
The finale of Showcase 2025 – I See Stars. Pic: Ryan Buchanan.
ENDS
