Nero: An undergraduate juvenility reigns in this Roman musical

This musical mess about the notorious Roman emperor carries content warnings about “blood, incest, nudity and violence”. To which I’d add: incoherence, arch and wooden acting, and a harp-centric score that riffles through musical genres but mostly consists of half-completed themes.The creation of the duo behind the similarly improbable but far superior Spring Awakening, Steven Sater (book and lyrics) and the late Ducan Sheik (music), it’s been in development for 23 years. What began as a play about George W Bush’s Iraq War apparently mutated into a haphazard musical satire on the Trumpian cult of personality in 2022 when veteran director Lindsay Posner and south Korean production company Seensee came on board. Finally fully staged, two months after Sheikh’s death at 56, it already looks dated in the light of the US midterms. Writing in the programme (£10!), producer Park Myung-Sung still hopes Nero will eventually become “the musical we have always envisioned”. Mate, I’d call it a day.To be fair, there are one or two fine songs: the slinky cabaret number Bosom of the Moon, sultrily delivered by Rhianne-Louise McCaulsky as Nero’s lover Poppeia; the bittersweet, transgressive duet The Lover From Hell by Andrew Barth’s Feldman’s Nero and Sally Dexter as his manipulative mum Agrippina. But much of the score feels unrooted and vague and the lyrics are often painfully effortful (“shall we climb our silver tower/and converse about our power?”)Andrew Barth Feldman and Rhianne Louise McCaulsky Manuel HarlanThere’s an appealingly trashy, wilful vulgarity underlying it all. And the sordid shenanigans of Imperial Roman politics certainly suggest that Nero, like Trump, was not sui generis but the logical product of a morally bankrupt system. “I’ve been f***ing my own uncle Claudius to get us here, so don’t start!” Agrippina snaps when Nero objects to her putting him on the throne and marrying him to his stepsister: all of this family has a problem with boundaries.But the show is both overstuffed and underdeveloped, simultaneously on-the-nose and off-the-mark, the creators constantly nudging and winking at the audience in a bid for relevance. Feldman’s Nero is a glitter-spangled bisexual man-baby who’d rather be in showbiz than in charge (his name is quite literally in lights on the gantry above the stage, where he makes his first diva-ish entrance). The production pastiches Greek tragedy, complete with a singing chorus. They open and shut dispatch-box briefcases fitted out with tongues and teeth for the samba-style Quelle Surprise sung by Nero’s mentor Seneca (“you’ve heard of him”), played with a level of quiet desperation by Stephen Carlile. The asymmetrical taupe garb of the ensemble offsets shimmering metallic creations worn by Poppeia and Nero’s increasingly outrageous outfits (diaphanous skirts and blouses, lingerie, gold leopardskin trousers and spangled heels). Dexter’s imperious Agrippina wears black and has a Mr Whippy swoosh of monochrome Cruella hair to emphasise her malevolence. Some serious money has been spent – or rather, squandered - on the costumes and a cast that includes rising Broadway star Feldman and stage and screen favourite Dexter alongside established musical theatre talents. And presumably on Posner, whose direction here is imperceptible, and who should immediately strike this debacle from his CV.Read MoreScenes shuffle randomly and hurriedly forward, with songs dropped in any old how. There are thuddingly obvious asides (“Make Rome Great Again!”) and absurdly pointed lyrics (“better hang on each word that he Tweets,” Seneca warbles, before repeating emphatically, “TWEEEETS!”). The equation between Nero’s and Trump’s self-aggrandisement and fondness for gold and monuments is all too obvious, but other aspects of his story simply don’t fit. An undergraduate juvenility reigns. At one point two characters throw up purely so Nero can shout “use the f***ing vomitorium” at them, deliberately misusing the term.Amid the five-strong band, wearing t-shirts bearing the names of classical Greek writers, harpist Catrin Meek (“Sappho”) stands out. The sound design is poor. Every now and then you get a tantalising glimpse of something interesting before it’s swamped by more nonsense. This travesty is all fiddle, no fire.