Everybody’s Talking About Jamie - Movie Musical Review

Most sixteen year old boys dream of being footballers, pop stars, or social media influencers. But Jamie New has very different aspirations. There is only one thing that he can imagine doing with his life, and that is performing as a drag queen.

Adapted from the stage musical of the same name, which was itself inspired by a BBC three documentary ‘Jamie: Drag Queen at 16’, the movie musical ‘Everybody’s Talking About Jamie’ follows school boy Jamie (Max Harwood) as he sets out to become a drag queen with the support of his mum Margaret (Sarah Lancashire) and her best friend Ray (Shobna Gulati). At school, things are less supportive with only Jamie’s friend Pritti Pasha (Lauren Patel) on his side as Billy Dean Paxman (Samuel Bottomly) sets out to make Jamie’s life miserable and teacher Miss Hedge (Sharon Horgan) tries to discourage his plans to wear a dress to prom.

Harwood’s Jamie is a dreamer, balancing optimism with reality checks and unaffordable to put the bullies in their place. He is confidence and flair on the outside, scared child on the inside, carrying the internalised shame caused by the disapproval of his hardly present father with him. To put things simply, he is just a boy with a dream who wishes to live how he wants freely, and Harwood plays the character with an innocence that wins over the viewer whilst delivering impressive vocals.

Margaret New, played by Sarah Lancashire, is supportive yet torn. She wants Jamie to pursue his dreams and succeed but knows that his choices won’t sit well with his father or the vast majority of his classmates. Lancashire plays with both heart and wisdom, and her rendition of the powerful ballad ‘He’s my Boy” easily becomes a standout moment. Shobna Gulati’s Ray is full of sassy attitude, adding a wonderful dose of comedy to the piece.

Pritta Pasha knows she’s smart, knows she’s different from her classmates and knows how to tell the bullies where to go with Lauren Patel creating a girl power figure who would do anything to support Jamie. Samuel Bottomsly’s Dean is the opposite, with no interest in school and a priority to bring people down, especially Jamie.

Richard E Grant puts in a memorable performance as Hugo Battersby, AKA the great Loco Chanel, once famous drag queen. I feel this is perhaps a larger role than the stage counterpart with us seeing more of the shop and Legs Eleven, and Grant creates a character affected by tragic past events who uses that trauma to drive himself forward and to become a guiding light for Jamie.

Whilst the vast majority of songs from the stage musical do make the jump to the screen, ‘Prom Song’, ‘Limited Edition Prom Night Special’, If I Met Myself Again’ and ‘Ugly in this Ugly World’ didn’t make the cut unfortunately. And, in addition, ‘The Legend of Coco Chanel’ is replaced with new number ‘This Was and’ giving Hugo a storyline less focused on individual turmoil centred instead around the LGBTQ+ community and their fight during the 1980s AIDS crisis.

Nevertheless, the songs we do get are greatly performed and movie magic means that we see several songs such as ‘And You Don’t Even Know It’, ‘Wall in my Head’ and ‘Work of Art’ on larger scales and with a dreamlike style as if seeing into the mind of Jamie himself.

Overall, this movie adaptation of Everybody’s Talking About Jamie balances, fun, comedy and fabulous drag with important topics such as rights, acceptance and being yourself, whilst staying true to the stage version, with a touching mention to the real life Jamie and his mum in the credits .