‘The most enjoyable you possibly can have with out an aqualung’ – The SpongeBob Musical evaluation

Any mum or dad of kids who grew up with the SpongeBob Cartoon on tv shall be conversant in the title music.

It consisted of only one refrain shrieked time and again: “SpongeBob SquarePants! SpongeBob SquarePants!! SpongeBob…SQUAREPANTS!!!”

It is ready within the undersea group of Bikini Bottom the place quite a lot of seafood and crustacea – SpongeBob (Lewis Cornay), dim starfish Patrick Star (Ifran Damani) and the Eeyore-like Squidward (Gareth Gates/Tom Read Wilson at chosen performances) – have adventures.

Kyle Jarrow’s musical might not win awards despite songs from John Legend, Cyndi Lauper and Flaming Lips however its constancy to the SpongeBob universe is spectacular.

Mad as a field of frogs, it tells a narrative of the 2 warring cafe house owners – Eugene Krabs (Richard J Hunt) and evil Sheldon J Plankton (Divina De Campo) – and the risk to Bikini Bottom from an undersea volcano that solely a bubble scientist can stop. 

Trouble is, the scientist in query is a squirrel (Chrissie Bhima) and never welcomed by lots of the group.

Halfway by this completely bonkers, hallucinatory musical I cottoned on to the themes operating by it – the facility of friendship, the necessity to embrace creatures of a special species/race/color and the equipment of science.

Gareth Gates is hysterical because the 4 legged Squidward, who has a present stopping faucet dance with an ensemble of sea creatures; drag diva De Campo is spectacular because the evil Sheldon and Hannah Lowther makes probably the most of his/her on off girlfriend Karen the Computer (don’t ask).

In vibrant yellow motley with nerdy glasses Lewis Cornay is terrific as Spongebob himself, accelerating from squishy nerd to reluctant hero with a bouncy confidence; his massive quantity I’m Not a Simple Sponge is accompanied by floating sponges within the fashion of Prague’s Black Light Theatre.

To hijack a Tom Wolfe title, it’s a kandy-koloured, tangerine-flake musical, child. The most enjoyable you possibly can have with out an aqualung.  

The SpongeBob Musical, QEH Southbank till August 27. Tickets: 020 3879 9555 (spongebobstage.com)