It is the 1960s in Georgia, USA. In Savannah, five young women – a journalist, a nurse, a housewife, and two teenaged sisters – form a gardening club. Only, they have no intentions of discussing petunias or pesticides. This in fact will be a cover for drug dealing as they try to get their hands on (and distribute) birth control pills. At the time, these were legally available only to married women: “no pill without a ring”.
The Gardening Club is a pop-rock musical written and produced by Carleigh McRitchie and Bella Wright, directed by Tara Noonan. Set in a time when women had precious little by way of body autonomy, this club is a revolutionary idea born out of the need to have some control over their lives.
What sounded exciting on paper did not, unfortunately, transfer well on to the stage. For one, the plot was diluted by all the other directions in which this plant chose to grow. It went into women’s empowerment at the workplace, young love, sexual freedom, and sexual self-awareness. All good causes, no doubt, but it came at the cost of the gardening club itself, the activities of which got precious little stage time.
The first half sketched out the characters, established the patriarchal spaces they occupied, and saw the formation of the club. The second half is where the story picked up a bit and offered some meat. You have the journalist Phoebe torn between her activism and career, the widowed nurse Betty discovers she doesn’t necessarily need a man in order to find pleasure, and the housewife Sheila talks about her traumatic abortion. Vicky, the youngest of the club members, finds out the hard way that the pill comes with extreme side effects. The play ends with news of the Roe v. Wade lawsuit and images of large demonstrations with women demanding reproductive rights.
Limitations of the script aside, the cast was excellent and the energy they put into the musical numbers got well-deserved applause. Emma Wallace as Phoebe, Olivia Taylor-Quinn as Betty, and Emma Espada as Maggie (the older of the two sisters) stood out with their ease on stage and ability to draw in the viewer.
The actual stage itself was left woefully under-used. A large part of the action took place in an often poorly-lit corner. A big digital screen formed the backdrop, but was seldom used. It did not help either that the production was plagued by technical issues of bad micing, less than perfect lighting, and music that drowned out words.
Choreographed beautifully by Aimee Leigh, the songs ‘The perks of being a man’ and ‘Edging to heaven’ made a mark. As did ‘Teach you to touch me’, which was a gentle exploration of a young couple slowly learning how to be with each other, with all its first-timer awkwardness and confusion.
During curtain call, makers of the show McRitchie and Wright told the audience that the musical is still being tweaked and perfected, which leads one to hope that the finished product will be much better. The current version has the bones – there is humour, some good songs, several great ideas – but it also has gaps to fill and heft to build.
Reviewer: Savitha Venugopal
Reviewed: 13th November 2025
North West End UK Rating:
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