Standing at the Sky’s Edge review

Making its West End transfer after successful runs at Sheffield’s Crucible Theatre in 2019 and 2022, and at London’s National Theatre last year, Chris Bush’s musical is a bittersweet, multigenerational epic.

Following the fortunes of families living in Sheffield’s iconic Park Hill estate, Robert Hastie’s busy production presents a kaleidoscope of poignant moments from across the decades – New Year’s Eve parties and election nights, celebrations and street fights. Bush’s characters are instantly recognisable, but their triumphs and tragedies are reduced to brief, emotionally resonant vignettes in Hastie’s headlong, breathless staging. Lynne Page’s playful choreography fills the stage with lively action, with performers locked in loops of repeated action, quietly getting on with their lives while vigorous dances break out around them. Sheffield-born songwriter Richard Hawley, formerly of bands Pulp and Longpigs, provides a nicely varied catalogue of wistful, poppy musical numbers, with an emphasis on bright, reverb-heavy guitar sounds and swelling, heartstring-tugging violins.

Ben Stones’ imposing set replicates the tower block’s brutalist architecture with soaring, square-sided columns and elevated walkways. The band itself takes up two floors of the immense structure – musicians are glimpsed playing live behind each window. Vivid lighting design by Mark Henderson continually repaints the grey, concrete walls with bold colours: moments of conflict play out under an indigo glare, while a sunrise sees the tower illuminated in warm reds and oranges.

New to the cast, Laura Pitt-Pulford is strong as affluent Londoner Poppy, who buys a flat on the estate during a period of gentrification. She’s skittish and full of unspoken frustration, desperate for a sense of belonging. Lauryn Redding is hugely charismatic as her ex, Nikki, announcing her arrival in the show with an absolutely belting rendition of Open Up Your Door. Nikki’s behaviour – she constantly turns up at Poppy’s home unannounced to berate her for leaving – feels obsessive rather than romantic, but the two actors’ chemistry smooths over the uneasy subtext.

Among the returning cast, Rachael Wooding stands out as 1960s housewife Rose, bursting with hope and gratitude when she first moves to the estate, but growing visibly harder and more wearied as the years pass and opportunities dry up. Her utterly heart-rending rendition of moody ballad After the Rain is the show’s emotional high point.

But it’s the big ensemble numbers that carry the production along, with There’s a Storm a-Comin’ and the title song evoking a fragile world at the mercy of sudden changes and chance occurrences. It’s a stirring tribute to the resilience of community and the importance of remaining optimistic.