Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss

In an additional, cheekily metatheatrical borrowing from life, the two best friends depicted on stage are also gossiping as a form of procrastination, to avoid writing a big important musical…

“It is obviously partially autobiographical, and both characters have quite a lot of both our personalities and experiences in them,” says Moss. “The central joke of the show is that these two people don’t really have anything ‘important’ to talk about because all they want to talk about is their own tragic little lives. But it ultimately asks the question – what are important stories? What are the stories that shape us and how we see things in our lives, particularly romantic love?”

They also wanted to recognise the kinds of love that don’t often have a song and dance made about them. “It is a big celebration of platonic love and friendship, and how there are so many different kinds of love,” says Moss. While romance is usually positioned as the main love story within our  lives – elevated as being “worthy of big fancy musicals” – they wanted to reassure people that all the many kinds of love in their lives are valid and worth immortalising.

‘[Six worked because] we were just writing what we thought would be fun and silly, without consciously trying to sell tickets’

Celebrating their friendship on stage is all very nice, but much of Why Am I So Single? also seems to be a frazzled scream of frustration at modern dating; one song already teased takes aim at people who constantly cancel dates at short notice. So was the show cathartic to write, I ask – a way to exorcise their own dating demons? The pair both cackle in agreement.

“At the time of writing, some of those songs” – Marlow breaks off to laugh briefly – “it felt like the true meaning of catharsis. There’s one song – we were meant to be writing something else, but I came in so frustrated about this guy, and I exploded all this frustration.”

“And I was feeling the same thing, about this other person,” Moss chimes in. “We just started writing the song and didn’t even realise it would be for the show, but then it was like: this actually obviously belongs in the show.”

Continues...

Did it mean that, even on a crap date, they at least knew it could be a good source of material? Moss pauses, then deadpans: “I’ll tell you my main experience: it is not hot when you tell someone you’re writing a show called Why Am I So Single?.

"It’s not very good flirting material! You think, maybe it will be hilarious? But, in fact, no. It’s off-putting…” I suggest that being able to tell people they’re the writers of hit musical Six might help, which Marlow bats away with sarcastic self deprecation: “‘Yeah don’t worry, I’m not weird, I’m also really obsessed with the Tudors…’”

But of course, they aren’t just Tudor history nerds – they are award-scooping international theatre superstars. To have such a whirlwind success with your first show is almost unheard of. Does it still feel surreal to them?

They both pause, then Marlow gives a small laugh and an extremely definitive yes.

“The Lowry [in Salford] is doing an exhibition based around Six the Musical, and asked if we could send any keepsakes, so I was looking at this box of things under my bed,” continues Marlow.

“I kept the tickets to the Broadway opening night, tickets to the first ever performance, the envelope that Vanessa Hudgens opened to announce our Tony win… I looked at this pile on my floor and thought: it is so weird that that stuff actually happened! It just makes me feel continuously overwhelmed and baffled and ridiculously grateful.”

Having written a massive hit also gives them a guaranteed income of the like that few young artists in British theatre ever enjoy. How big a difference has it made to their creative practice, having that financial security?

“It makes the absolute world of difference,” replies Moss, quickly and seriously. “We are so, so fortunate. With Why Am I So Single?, we had the space to develop this as us – to take our time to write what we actually want to write. [But] the vast majority of people have to try to get stuff out there, get it seen, chase the funding and theatres… I realise the value of space. And I think that’s what money does.”

Having such a strong track record – and having such a devoted fandom across social media – also means they can open a show straight into the West End, with a lavish cast and creative team to match.

Why Am I So Single? is subtitled A Big Fancy Musical – because Marlow and Moss had no intention of scaling down their ambition (or budget) just because the show is “essentially about two best friends sitting on the sofa”, as Marlow puts it. They wanted their two fictional counterparts – played by Six alumnus Leesa Tulley and Jo Foster (& Juliet) – to get the full works, with a chorus of 15 to help tell the story.

“When you read it, you could think it is basically a two-hander,” says Moss. “No no no. It’s a big fancy musical with a dance ensemble – it’s like The Prince of Egypt or old-school musicals, where the principal actors do the acting scenes and then dancing happens around it.”

They may have gone a little too big, however, Moss reflects. “I was talking to our choreographer [Ellen Kane] and she was like: ‘Most musicals only have six or seven really big musical numbers…’ It would have been good to know that, before we wrote 14 of them into it!

“It is just such a beast, this show,” concludes Moss, sounding knackered. The only time we can find to chat, four weeks into rehearsals, is 9am Zoom calls with Marlow and Moss on their phones as they commute from east London to rehearsals; I get a few views up their nostrils as they clamber in and out of cabs, but there’s also a thrilling moment when Marlow spots a gigantic advert for the show, filling an entire gable end of a London street. They may have already had the sort of head-spinning success few people ever achieve, let alone while still in their 20s, but they’re not  so blasé that seeing their new musical’s name in enormous letters doesn’t make them squee and grin.

Marlow and Moss kept a tight rein on Why Am I So Single? at first – just the two of them working on it in snatched corners of time, over several years. They say they were lucky that their producers – Kenny Wax, George Stiles, Ameena Hamid – trusted them to get on with it. “It’s a huge testament to our producers that the show has maintained its creative vision from the early days. They’ve just [said]: ‘We back the show’; it wasn’t like: ‘Oh, do you think Anne Boleyn should come on?’” laughs Marlow.

They did do a workshop last year at Sadler’s Wells, which helped the producers wrap their heads around the pair’s vision of a big fancy musical – rather than a two-hander with a sofa. It was helpful in developing a visual language for the show: how they would use the dance ensemble to bring to life the modern dating world, with all its dating apps and phone screens.

“There are bits where the ensemble plays the phone!” says Moss. “And we have a number where the text sounds are replicated in tap dance. It’s super fun, trying to be as inventive as possible.”

They are also, naturally, presenting a diverse, queer dating scene on stage. “It’s exciting to be adding more queerness to the West End,” says Marlow. “It’s amazing, seeing more and more queer roles and trans roles in big mainstream musical theatre.”

‘Why Am I So Single? is a big celebration of platonic love and friendship, and how there are so many different kinds of love’ – Lucy Moss

Besides, it would be weird, frankly, if Marlow and Moss didn’t include a range of sexualities and gender identities –that’s just a reality of dating for them and their peers. But when I ask them if they feel any pressure, as a mouthpiece for a younger generation within theatre, they seem tickled by the question. “That’s so funny. The one thing this process has made me not feel is young. Everyone in our company is 10 years younger than me, I feel 4,000 years old,” quips Moss, before adding: “Being serious, I think that is a weight that Toby and I feel.

“People who are our age aren’t usually the ones who get to speak directly to the people who are in charge,” continues Moss. “You don’t feel like it’s the adults and the kids – it’s like the kids are running the room!” 

But mostly, that sense of responsibility shows up in how they want to run the process, rather than in any specific vision for representing Gen Z on stage. It’s important to them that they have a welcoming audition room – they always applaud at the end of a song “because there’s something so serious and businessy about going: ‘Thank you very much’ instead of ‘Wow!’” says Moss. In rehearsals, too, she wants to create an open, egalitarian environment.

“Hopefully it feels like a space where everyone can speak to everybody.”

Still, they have also assembled some impressive ‘adults’ in the creative team for Why Am I So Single?. Most eye catching, perhaps, are Future Cut – Tunde Babalola and Darren Lewis – a songwriting and producing duo behind hits by Lily Allen, Rihanna and Shakira.

Continues...

The score for Why Am I So Single? includes much pastiche of classic musicals – “whether that’s an old Hollywood, Fred Astaire thing or something from a blockbuster musical of the 1980s”, says Marlow – but also lots of different types of pop song. And Future Cut has helped them take that sound to the next level: “It’s combining big traditional musical elements with technological poppy things. They go: ‘Okay, what about this sound’ – and make some weird sound I’ve never heard before. They just have really brilliant brains.”  

Six fans should find plenty to enjoy, but Why Am I So Single? also casts its net further in terms of musical-theatre influences. So, what were their own inspirations – how did they come to love musicals?

Moss’ family were not artsy at all: “My mum was a tax manager and my dad was a fund manager, my brother does crypto financey stuff… basically no one is artistic!” Her route in was dance lessons – but she does also pinpoint being taken to see The Lion King. “I remember looking over my shoulder and seeing the animals coming down the aisle, [and being] like: Wow, what is this?”

Marlow’s inspiration was similarly feline. Both parents were musicians, so there was always lots of music and instruments in the house – but the spark of interest in musical theatre came with the arrival of Cats on VHS one Christmas.

“I remember obsessively sitting inches away from the TV, kneeling down and staring at the video of Cats. For my birthday we went to London and I got to see Cats alive in the flesh, and I just remember being so overwhelmed at these people throwing themselves around dressed as cats… and do you know what? I still am!”

Perhaps this should be no surprise: when it comes to seriously successful musicals about very silly subjects, Cats has got to be up there – proof that you can make a Big Fancy Musical about absolutely anything so long as you’ve got the tunes, and the vision. With Marlow and Moss behind it, Why Am I So Single? seems likely to be blessed with both.

Q&A Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss

What was your first non-theatre job?

Marlow: I worked in a toy shop.
Moss: I worked in three shops at the same time – in FatFace, in a school uniform shop (which I was really bad at) and as a cage dancer in Cyber Dog in Camden.

What was your first professional theatre job?

Moss: I was assistant director on the show Boris: World King, which went to Trafalgar Studios and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

What do you wish someone had told you when you were starting out?

Marlow: Just always give people the benefit of the doubt. It makes for better collaborations, better environments and better work. It’s something I think about a lot.

Moss: I wish people had told me to take the professional side less seriously, but to take the amateur side more seriously – back the work you’re doing, even if it’s just a show with your friends.

Who or what is your biggest influence?

Marlow: Mine is literally Lucy Moss!

Moss: Toby Marlow…

What is your best advice for auditions?

Marlow: It’s more for after the audition, but [know that] it’s not that you weren’t good. There are so many times when it genuinely is the case that lots of people could do a role brilliantly, and a choice just has to be made.

Moss: It’s so lame, but just “be yourself”. If you’re trying desperately to pretend to be something else, it makes it hard for the person auditioning to tell whether you are the right fit.

If you hadn’t gone into making musicals, what would you have been?

Marlow: Probably a performer. And maybe I will soon – who knows…?

Moss: Maybe a journalist?

Why Am I So Single? is at London’s Garrick Theatre from August 27-February 13; For more details click here