★★★

“None of what follows would be remotely plausible without the sterling performance of Johnson Willis who wholly inhabits the fractious rebel”

Stilted Guitar Dalek, poet, philosopher and musical pioneer Wilko Johnson enjoys yet another resurgence in writer Jonathan Maitland’s affectionate stage biography.

The Dr Feelgood founder was famously diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2012 but remarkably lived another decade or so. At his farewell concert in Camden in 2013 he was so spritely for a dead man walking that a doctor friend suggested he might be a candidate for a life-saving op. And so it came about.

However, we meet the musician just after his initial diagnosis and find him in good spirits.
“I can live with it,” he says of his cancer. “I can be alive with it.”

The death sentence takes him back to the beginning, to his Canvey Island youth, abusive father, teenage love and musical escape.

None of what follows would be remotely plausible without the sterling performance of Johnson Willis who wholly inhabits the fractious rebel. His nasal intonation, coupled with his studied over pronunciation and stiff physicality bring to mind Kenneth Williams as a Thunderbirds puppet.

Director Dugald Bruce-Lockhart’s production takes us on a journey of Essex, drugs and rock’n’roll as Wilko discovers a way of adapting the blues to fit his version of England – all oil terminals, chip shops and clinches under the pier. Dr Feelgood produce a clipped and insistent interpretation of R&B that brings them chart success and paves the way for punk.

The cast, who previously provided cameos to illustrate Wilko’s fragmented origin story, comes together to form Dr Feelgood and everything makes sense, both for Wilko and the audience.

Georgina Field (bass), David John (drums), and Jon House (vocals and harmonica) are a tight unit. House’s Lee Brilleaux, in particular, brings his A-game to offer up a rug-burning explosion of dad rock.

In Maitland’s unbalanced re-telling, the play rushes past the Dr Feelgood heyday too early, dismissing the intriguing artistic spat between Wilko and Brilleaux in a few unhelpful lines. The reasons why Dr Feelgood went on to greater success without their destructive songwriter are never explored.

Afterwards, with Wilko drifting, the play seems to run out of momentum, and we are left – along with Wilko – mourning the passing of his sparky wife Irene (a lovely performance by Georgina Fairbanks) who stayed with him despite his numerous cruel infidelities.

Little wonder then that the production uses Wilko’s second lease of life and his Scrooge-like transformation to bring about a fantasy Dr Feelgood reunion gig which adds little dramatic coherence but gives the audience what they want when they need it most.

The Guardian once wrote that Wilko Johnson was “a 100-1 shot to be our Greatest Living Englishman”. We get glimpses of that cantankerous, selfish, charismatic and much-cherished artist, but this production is frustratingly incurious about the contradictions, aspiring to be kind rather than clinical. Feelgood by name…

WILKO at the Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch

★★★★

“The show doesn’t just lay down the facts. It is a well-informed celebration. A nostalgia trip that also looks forward as well as backwards”

“Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you can tune into the ecstasy of life” declares John Wilkinson (more famously known as Wilko), bathed in the foggy orange glow of the Canvey Island oil refinery. Invariably Wilko was unlucky, yet he still managed to cling onto this ideology for dear life even – or rather especially – when it was slipping away from him. This is a man who bathes in the comfort of certainty; rejects religion and its tatty astrological and spiritual cast-offs in favour of science and creative pragmatism “being given twelve months to live is a great career move”. A rebel poet who never really grew up. An intellectual trapped in a chav’s body.

Jonathan Maitland’s biographical ‘play with music’ goes some way to explaining the outside forces that mould such a contradictory character but doesn’t dig too deep. Using quotations from Wilko himself, mixed with his own dynamic prose and the inimitable sound of Dr. Feelgood, Maitland opts for a more entertaining and dramatic approach. It is both a tribute and a tribute act. Dugald Bruce-Lockhart’s staging is quite a mash-up of styles that, on paper, should never work. On the stage, however, in the hands of a quintet of actor/musos it creates a powerful and compelling piece of theatre.

Wilko famously stated that his terminal cancer made him feel alive. Johnson Willis’ portrayal of him pulses with the same vitality and energy, and uncanny attention to detail. The roughcast Estuary drawl is as full of Shakespeare quotes as expletives and his tantrums burn with misunderstood indignation. If Willis has a strong grasp of the personality, he nails the physicality and musicianship; pacing around the stage with eyes like searchlights, his jerking head movements in time to the stark, percussive chords of his guitar, wielded like a machine gun. Willis’ star turn is matched by Jon House’s Lee Brilleaux – the band’s frontman – who died of cancer at the age of 41. We witness the bitter personality clash and arguments that broke up the band in the late seventies. In Maitland’s narrative they even extend beyond the grave as Brilleaux returns like Marley’s ghost, ultimately leading to a spectral reconciliation. House multiroles, as do the other cast members, displaying versatility and sleight of hand costume changes. David John, when not behind the drum kit brilliantly adopts many personas, as does Georgina Field, who predominantly convinces as bassist ‘Sparko’ with a persuasive, gender-swapped portrayal and stage presence.

“The cast excel at reproducing the Dr. Feelgood sound”

The love of Wilko’s life, Irene Knight, left him a widower a decade before his own cancer diagnosis. Georgina Fairbanks is no wallflower, and she presents a steely Irene, evoking how much she meant to Wilko and how much her untimely death – also from cancer – shaped the musician’s outlook on life. Not so successful are earlier flashbacks to Wilko’s childhood which hint at domestic violence and emotional abuse.

The show doesn’t just lay down the facts. It is a well-informed celebration. A nostalgia trip that also looks forward as well as backwards. Thankfully lacking in sentimentality there is still much pathos. And more than its fair share of humour. We drift in and out of reality as we shift from designer Nicolai Hart-Hansen’s hospital room backdrop to Thames Estuary skyline, to rehearsal room, to stage. The switch from dialogue to music is seamless too. The cast excel at reproducing the Dr. Feelgood sound, complete with the rough edges that “didn’t just usher in Punk, but fucking invented it!” as Wilko would say.

It is fitting that the show concludes with an encore rather than a curtain call. After some gorgeous, slightly surreal moments, including a beautiful a Capella rendition of Leadbelly’s ‘Goodnight Irene’ at Irene Knight’s funeral, the dry ice billows from the stage and the cast launch into a trio of upbeat, uplifting, foot stomping numbers. The band are in full swing, replicating the huge feelgood factor of Dr. Feelgood with staccato precision and virtuosity – particularly House’s impressive blues harp playing.

“Death gives me a technicolour gaze” hollers Wilko. This company give a technicolour performance. The filmmaker, Julian Temple, described Wilko Johnson as ‘one of the great English eccentrics, a great national treasure waiting to be discovered’. Jonathan Maitland’s “Wilko” is its own little treasure. Well worth discovering.

WILKO

Southwark Playhouse Borough

★★★

“None of what follows would be remotely plausible without the sterling performance of Johnson Willis who wholly inhabits the fractious rebel”

WILKO

Southwark Playhouse Borough

Reviewed on 24th March 2025

by Giles Broadbent

Photography by Mark Sepple

Previously reviewed at this venue:

WILKO

WILKO

WILKO

WILKO at the Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch

★★★★

“The show doesn’t just lay down the facts. It is a well-informed celebration. A nostalgia trip that also looks forward as well as backwards”

“The cast excel at reproducing the Dr. Feelgood sound”