Review: RADIO GAGA, Adelphi Theatre

The West End premiere of RADIO GAGA, The Ultimate Celebration of Queen, took place at the wondrous Adelphi Theatre on Tuesday 14 November 2023 for one night only. This show is the start of a tour that runs across the United Kingdom, over the next year from London to Edinburgh.

The show features Mark Sanders as icon Freddie Mercury, with Richard Ashford as the epic Brian May in a classic black curly wig, Michael Richards as sensational drummer Roger Taylor, Jon Caulton as cool bassist John Deacon and Ben Parkinson supporting expertly on keys.

We entered to an excitable atmosphere, as superfans of Queen anticipated the drama and iconic repertoire. Band equipment filled the stage and the show began with the song ‘Flash’ with a costume colour theme of red, white and yellow.

Sanders sauntered on in his first outfit of the night, stark white in all his glory, emulating mic stand hand play, including movement and mannerisms of Mercury, which we hotly anticipated. “Hello Adelphi!” he called. It was rather a thrill to have a heaving audience and the joy from the crowd was palpable. Sanders had fun with the act in a somewhat understated way, but there was still assured confident in his abilities- alongside the bottom-slapping! The band performed "Tie Your Mother Down" and classics "Under Pressure" and "Don’t Stop Me Now" to the audience’s glee. The tribute band explained a particular favour for the Queen songs from the 1970’s, but got all the big hits in.

Sanders enjoyed riffing with the audience over the course of the evening, getting them to sing back his ‘yeahs’ and ‘alrights’ in a way reminiscent of Freddie at Live Aid, and told us “you can join the band” when we pleased him with our high-volume replies. He encouraged the audience to wave and sway to the collectively loved music. A high point came when Sanders appeared in a Marilyn Monroe t-shirt, building atmosphere in "Somebody to Love" and creating a beat in "Another One Bites the Dust".

Alternating fuschia and blue lights bathed the stage at points, with notably strong Lighting Designer Tye Connolly deserving credit, for providing concert style atmosphere, in amongst the enveloping smoke machine.

Sanders lovingly dedicated "Bicycle" to Freddie and gave opportunities to band members Richards and Caulton for solos. The band had a particularly joyful moment with "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" revelling in the beauty of the lyrics.

As someone who counts seeing Queen with Adam Lambert at the o2 as one of their most wondrous moments, and who is proudly into their double figures of watching Ben Elton’s We Will Rock You musical, it is a tough gig emulating the energy, purity of voice and stage presence of Mercury, but the band did brilliantly well to bring their love of the theatre of Queen and the music together via their very own tribute band.

Look out for the final costume change, RadioGaga is a joyful night out, if you love a big sing-a-long.

Catch Radio GaGa, The Ultimate Tribute to Queen perform across the UK until November 2024 

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