Musik Archives - thespyinthestalls.com

★★★★

“Barber gives the character everything she has”

Jonathan Harvey and the Pet Shop Boys’ salacious, scandalous and searingly funny “Musik” is only an hour long, but it will take stage management twice as long each night to clear up all the celebrity names dropped. It’s a good thing, too, that we’re fully aware that this is a work of complete fiction (although we would love it to be all true) otherwise the libel lawyers would outnumber the paying audience. Mind you, my guess is that they’d be won over pretty rapidly by Frances Barber’s brilliant and hilarious delivery of Harvey’s script, that charts the outrageous life of a certain Billie Trix.

So, who is this Billie Trix? She was first introduced to the world in the 2001 musical, ‘Closer to Heaven’ as a retired rock icon and actress. Although the narrator, she had a relatively small part of the story. In 2019, Harvey and the Pet Shop Boys created “Musik”, the spin-off cabaret show that propelled Trix to centre stage, exploring her back story from her ignominious birth in war-torn Berlin to the present day. Not quite a ‘cradle-to-grave’ story, as she still manages to keep the latter at bay, against all the odds. Six songs pepper the narrative, opening with ‘Mongrel’. “Times were tough, but I was tougher…” she croons in her ravaged voice, “times were rough, but I was rougher”. Yet by the final song she is undeniably celebratory, belting out the fact that you’ve got to live your life for every moment (she certainly has). “We never know what’s round the corner” she says by way of introduction, “and that’s what gives me hope”.

And what corners she has turned, managing to find herself at the forefront of each revolution in pop culture; giving birth to the American folk revival, inventing ‘Disco’, inspiring Andy Warhol’s pop art culture, creating Madonna’s image and – in an update since its 2019 premier – unwittingly causing the global pandemic. She witnessed Vietnam, rejected the hand of a young Trump (good move), and got up to all graphically described shenanigans with the likes of Lou Reed, Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock, Damien Hirst, Tracy Emin, Mick (and Bianca) Jagger, Frank Zappa, Shania Twain, Jean-Paul Sartre, even the Dalai Lama… I could go on. Trix is clearly delusional, and her memoir is fantastical. She is larger than life, arrogant, self-assured and psychotically callous and indifferent to opinion. But she is adorable, charismatic, and laugh-out-loud hilarious. Barber gives the character everything she has, bringing her to life and making her preposterous anecdotes totally believable… almost. With expert comic timing, Barber mixes over-the-top self-aggrandisement with dead-pan self-deprecation, conquering the stage and the audience with a performance Billie Trix could only dream of.

Terry Johnson directs the show with the pulsating pace of a Pet Shop Boys dance anthem. Barber talks and moves at 120bpm, seamlessly segueing into the musical numbers. The unmistakable Tennant and Lowe synth-pop backing does give a vague karaoke feel to the songs, but Barber’s crackling vocals adds the required depth, aided by Harvey’s and the duo’s scathingly clever lyrics. The songs are not necessarily what we’ll be taking home with us – it is Harvey’s razor-sharp writing, coupled with Barber’s fiercely formidable performance that will be truly remembered. Billie Trix insists that she is a ‘gift to the world’. A dubious claim. But there’s no doubting that Frances Barber is a gift to the theatre world. Her character is indomitable, her show unmissable.

Musik

Leicester Square Theatre

Reviewed – 11th February 2020

★★★★

“Barber’s delivery is as fantastic as the words are fantastical.”

You’re not long into “Musik” before you realise that this isn’t really a musical at all. Although it features six original songs penned by the Pet Shop Boys, the focus is unquestionably on Jonathan Harvey’s wonderfully outrageous script and the sheer personality that bursts forth from Frances Barber’s magnificent performance.

Barber plays Billie Trix, a retired rock icon and actress in this sequel to ‘Closer To Heaven’ which premiered nearly twenty years ago just around the corner at the Arts Theatre to somewhat mixed reviews. Trix was a minor character but even then, Barber made her the star of the production, so it seems inevitable that she be given her own show. And as she strides through the auditorium up to the stage, she makes no bones about this being her show. Barber owns the character outright, and to some extent the script, allowing herself some ad hoc ad libs. Madonna’s cancelled gig at the Palladium is the first target of Billie Trix’s acerbic banter.

It’s a kind of cradle to grave narration. Although, despite her sex-and-drugs-and-rock-and-roll life of excess, Trix is determined to keep her unavoidable destination at arm’s length. She was born a ‘mongrel’, her own mother’s one regret, but rises above this with the narcissist’s belief against all odds that she is a ‘gift to the world’. We never know for sure how much she believes her own fantasy, but we are spellbound by her anecdotal wizardry. The ushers will surely have their work cut out after the show, sweeping up the countless names she has dropped. She’s been there, done that and has the emotional scars to prove it. Andy Warhol stole her Campbells’ Soup Tins idea. Madonna stole her image; even Trump stole her virginity (though he was then a skinny lad called Otto). We want to believe it all as she takes us on her journey from post-war Berlin to the rock arenas of the world, via Vietnam and a Soho phone box. She has shared moments with them all – the Beatles, Lou Reid, Nico, Dalí, Damien Hirst, Eminem, Jean-Paul Sartre, Frank Zappa…

Trix was at the forefront of each revolution in pop culture. Brecht’s original ‘Mother Courage’, a star of the New York art-house film scene, the pioneer of Disco; the darling of the Surrealists and the scourge of the Young British Artists. Trix looks back on her fantastical life with bitterness but in Barber’s hands the only real rage we witness is that of laughter. Barber’s delivery is as fantastic as the words are fantastical. The further Billie Trix falls into obscurity the higher Frances Barber rises. You can see the sparks fly as she hones Harvey’s already razor-sharp script.

If anything, the music softens the punch. Trix showers us with a bewildering cascade of anecdotes and one-liners, which make the musical interludes feel a bit like a commercial break. The synth-pop sound does little to reference the text, although the lyrics do shine through thanks to Barber’s crackling voice. Unlike Trix, Barber knows her limitations and it is this loveable self-deprecation that allows us to love such an unloveable, foul-mouthed character.

“Someone make it stop!” Trix shouts out at one point. A vain exclamation as Barber is unstoppable. Trix may be washed up, but Barber is on the crest of a wave with this role.

MUSIK

Wilton’s Music Hall

★★★★

“Barber gives the character everything she has”

MUSIK

Wilton’s Music Hall

Reviewed on 17th October 2025

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Charlie Flint

Previously reviewed at this venue:

MUSIK

MUSIK

MUSIK

Leicester Square Theatre

Reviewed – 11th February 2020

★★★★

“Barber’s delivery is as fantastic as the words are fantastical.”

“Someone make it stop!” Trix shouts out at one point. A vain exclamation as Barber is unstoppable. Trix may be washed up, but Barber is on the crest of a wave with this role.

Reviewed by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Marc Brenner

Musik

Leicester Square Theatre until 1st March

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

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