Frozen musical review: Girl power production of iconic Disney film will melt cold hearts

Frozen the musical has hit the stage in London (Picture: Getty)

Has any musical opened to such a vast ready-made audience? Frozen is one of the highest-grossing films of all time, for a start.

As the Disney behemoth finally rolls into town, a year behind schedule, it really has only one task: to not let down those who love the film.

As befits the biggest show of the year, Michael Grandage’s production at the Theatre Drury Lane certainly looks spectacular.

The castle scenes are story-book magical, like a Brothers Grimm story illustrated by an Old Master. Ladies twirl in dresses the colour of Quality Street. The ice-scapes, seemingly sponsored by Swarovski crystal, glitter so brightly your eyes hurt.

There are a couple of proper gasp-inducing sleights of hand, although nothing with the ingenuity to rival Harry Potter.

As in the film, the real star of the show is Olaf, the sun-loving snowman, although there is some serious puppet rivalry in the form of a spectacularly woolly Sven.

Samantha Barks, as Elsa, led the cast for the production (Picture: Getty)

The problem is that the best bits (and the worst) are all Disney. Several new songs by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez augment those of the film but few linger.

Let It Go – belted out, how else, by Samantha Barks’ pretty inscrutable Elsa – remains the climactic moment. Barks and a strenuously chirpy Stephanie McKeon do what they can as the semi-estranged sisters but are strait-jacketed by formulaic characterisation (emotionally crippled Elsa; mischievous Anna).

Frozen the film partly gets away with not being that interested in either Elsa and Anna’s weird, complicated relationship or the rich feminist symbolism of Elsa as a woman demonised because of her power because, hey, it’s Disney, but you yearn in vain for Grandage to dive deeper.

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And while you can never technically fault his slick, entertaining production, it hardly blows you away with its theatrical vision.

But I doubt many will be complaining. The show has a giddy sense of fun. Obioma Ugoala has charisma to burn as Kristoff, Oliver Ormson is a dashingly villainous Hans, while Richard Frame is delicious as the pompous Weselton: ‘I’m not a man, I’m a Duke.’

Despite the endless winter, the show generates plenty of warmth. Grandage may have been strait-jacketed himself creatively but he certainly delivers what most audiences want: a decent facsimile of a beloved film.

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