This can't surprise anyone, can it? The critics have spoken, and Spice Girls jukebox musical Viva Forever didn't spice up any of their lives.
Written by Absolutely Fabulous creator Jennifer Saunders and incorporating songs by the '90s girl group, Viva Forever was produced by Judy Cramer, also responsible for the Abba musical, Mamma Mia!, which is still going strong on West End. Forever doesn't look set to follow in its footsteps.
Charles Spencer (The Telegraph) has been perhaps the harshest critic, writing a single-star lashing that opened with this: "I'll tell you what I wanted, what I really really wanted — I wanted this terrible show to stop."
Libby Purves (The Times) described Saunders' story as "scrappy, lazy, cliched and inconclusive", to the point where "the lyrics only match the moment about three times."
Alun Palmer (The Mirror) says the show sucks the fun out of the group's tunes: "Many of the band's biggest hits have been turned into such dirges they make laughing laughing Leonard Cohen's work sound like the Teletubbies."
Paul Taylor (The Independent) also laid the blame at Saunders' feet: "Charmless, messy, lacklustre... embarrassingly derivative of Mamma Mia! and looks way past its sell-by date in its utterly surprise-free satiric swipe at the X Factor."
Mark Shenton (Sunday Express) wasn't much kinder: "Viva Forever is a phoney, manufactured musical about a phoney, manufactured band, marooned by a structurally inept, unfunny script."
Time Out hasn't graced the musical with a full review, but tweeted this: "Due to technical glitches our Viva Forever review has failed to go live. However, as a taster we can tell you that Viva Forever is awful."
Alex Petridis (The Guardian) was one of the only critics in attendance who found something nice to say: "Compared to We Will Rock You, it's a work of untrammelled genius."
It's uncertain if Viva Forever will come to Australia — with reviews like these, it just got a little more unlikely.
