Brightly coloured nonsense ... Peter Pan El Musical. Photograph: Hugo Philpott/EPA
There's nothing like a raft of bad reviews of a big new West End show to get theatre some extra coverage. Thus it was that Saturday's Guardian reported that Tomas Leon Padilla, the producer behind the much-derided Peter Pan El Musical , has accused Britain's theatre critics of "defending a well-established business to protect their market from any foreign company that could take a piece of the cake." I've heard critics accused of many things, but this is quite possibly the most outrageous claim yet. Sure, the producer is unlikely to share the critics' disparaging view of a show, but the charge that British critics are seeking to drive out this month-long Spanish production from "their market" is ludicrous.
In what possible world does anyone think that critics ever "defend a well-established business to protect their market"? Theatres are not a critic's market, newspapers and websites are. As far as I'm aware, no critic owns shares in either the Garrick or any other theatre. The primary loyalties of a theatre critic are to their readers, their editor and their publication. Of course theatre critics care about what happens in theatres, not least because they have to watch so much of it, but they certainly aren't in the business of helping them financially.
I also don't believe that any critic cares where a show is from. There's almost an accusation of racism in the final clause that critics are seeking to defend this ill-defined "market"of theirs "from any foreign company that could take a piece of the cake." In fact, there is Afrika! Afrika! at the O2, the Young Vic's warmly received South African Magic Flute and a raft of American shows in the West End at the moment, and don't critics spend quite a lot of time seeing international work presented at the Barbican, the Gate and Sadler's Wells? Aren't critics, on the whole, a cultured bunch who appreciate the opportunity to sample work from across the world? Maybe if no British work was staged over a period of months because of an influx of work from other countries, it might attract some comment. When the fifth new Broadway transfer in a row opens, with not a new British musical in sight, a critic may wonder if this is an entirely healthy state of affairs. It won't affect his or her view of the particular show, though. If it's good, it's good, and it's good that it's on.
The only reason that the Spanish origins of Peter Pan El Musical were raised is that virtually the entire production is in Spanish. With surtitles. Aimed primarily at an age-range half of which probably can't read. The surtitles, for the record, are shoddily spelt, badly punctuated, and illogically sequenced (not to mention unintentionally hilarious). That said, small children seem quite happy with Night Garden and the Teletubbies, so given the brightly coloured, frequently incomprehensible nature of this odd musical perhaps children do indeed constitute its ideal audience. Critics, however, can only report what they see (even the Official London Theatre Guide's first night puff piece can't quite manage to say it's good), and what they saw was brightly coloured, cheaply produced, baffling nonsense. Such judgements have nothing to do with external factors such as nationality and markets - they are to do with quality and not-quality.
