Britain has had two civil wars, and the second was the titanic battle that ran between 1985 and 1985 as our nation’s miners who were the shock troops of the industrial working class took on Thatcher’s Tory government.
This stage revival of the hit movie Brassed Off takes place a decade after that bitter dispute in the fictional pit village of Grimley where the miners are agonising whether to vote to take a big redundancy package and let their mine die. Meanwhile, troubled young miner Andy is finding love with his school flame Gloria who has come back home, but is she who she appears to be?
Paul Allen’s witty and often bleak adaptation also uses the colliery’s brass band – led by obsessive conductor Danny who believes music is the answer to everything – to explore the idea of what community means, and the deep emotional and financial scars left by the great strike.
Brass bands are a uniquely working class artform almost always based around mines, or other heavy industrial sites, where highly skilled and often self taught musicians emerged from the bowels of the earth to play complex arrangements of classical tunes. Director Amy Leach rightly decided she needed a live band onstage so has recruited Horbury Victoria and Wakefield Metropolitan Brass Bands who come together each night to form a brass supergroup who also gamely join in the onstage action, with no little skill as they are performers in their own right. Their playing is of the highest standard, and the emotion they infuse into live performances had plenty of people shedding tears – including me.
Like the movie there was plenty of sort of bleak humour to be found in dangerous workplaces where men like Jim and Harry – amusingly played by old hands Andy Cryer and Ewen Cummings – use banter to express affection for their mates who down the pit they must rely on to stay alive. Unlike other posh auteurs who specialise in a rose tinted version of working class communities Allen and Leach never patronise these tough and often flawed people by pretending it’s all nobility when people are struggling. Watching Danny’s son and trombonist Phil disintegrating as the bailiffs strip his home is heart rending, leaving him literally on the edge of existence in a subtly staged but horrific suicide scene.
Katie Scott’s massive industrial set complete with working pithead wheel dominates the stage acting as reminder of the power of one industry over a small community, and Leach cleverly uses the space to recreate the big set pieces that made the movie such a joy with her typical imagination and energy
When the band enter a walking band competition Leach offers a masterclass in control in such a small space as they form up to march off in perfect unison before it all goes horribly wrong as they sink too many pints much to Danny’s disgust. Full marks to the real band members who have clearly done a few walking competitions showing the actors how to march and play, and this deceptively simple but ruthlessly choreographed sequence may be Leach’s best work in this space.
The scene where a dying Danny is serenaded in his hospital bed with a heartfelt Danny Boy as his band play in their mining helmets and safety lamps could so easily have overplayed for cheap emotion, but instead Leach perceptively captures the unspoken love for their mentor and the defiance of a band determined to go down fighting. Leach and Allen include the women who stood with their men during the strike using Wendy Albiston and Pauline Tomlin’s characters to make sure that contribution is fully acknowledged.
David Birrell brings a quiet dignity to Danny, who is raging against his own mortality and that of his industry, absolutely nailing his climactic speech at the national brass band competition in the Albert Hall where he issues a searing indictment of putting profits before decent hard working people. There is no greater compliment than if the late great Pete Postlethwaite who played Danny in the film was looking down he would be clapping Birrell along with the rest of us.
Robin Morrissey offers a nuanced Phil sparring with Danielle Henry as his long suffering wife Sandra, but both dig really deep to show the couple’s pain and deep bond despite their appalling predicament. Frazer Hadfield is believable as lovelorn Andy torn between the mine or something bigger outside the village, and Maddie Hansen makes Gloria a fully rounded woman torn between loyalty to her community or her job.
In a world where millions rely on foodbanks and exist on zero contracts this often raw love letter to a now dead industry and an irresistible plea for community couldn’t be better timed. The bonus is the glorious sound of a top brass band supergroup in full flight which raises the roof throughout this must see production.
Brassed off is at Leeds Playhouse until July 11th 2026. To book 0113 2137700 or www.leedsplayhouse.org.uk
Reviewer: Paul Clarke
Reviewed: 24th June 2026
North West End UK Rating: