Thank You For The Music

I realise in advance that this post threatens to destroy in an instant any credibility I've built up over the last few years in presenting myself as a cynical and on occasions angst-ridden Smiths fan, so I'm going to make my confession early on and get it over with: on Friday night I went to see Mamma Mia. No, wait, that's not the worst bit. I LOVED it.

I really did. I absolutely loved it. Much as I'm relishing the opportunity for a spot of self-absorded-yet-communal mopery in the form of an Eels gig in September, I sent my inner Smiths fan into temporary hibernation for the night and rocked up with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law to the Prince of Wales Theatre in Coventry Street (yeah, the yellow one you can buy on the Monopoly board. In case you every wondered where it is, it's just next to Leicester Square - much where it is on the Monopoly board, in fact.) Now if you are one of the three-or-so people left in the Western world who hasn't been to see the Meryl-Streep-sings-ooh-Dominic-Cooper-is-nice-I-hope-they-sing-Waterloo frenzy that was the film version of Mamma Mia, let me explain the storyline. First of all it has NOTHING to do with Abba, much in the same way as the (even less-convincing) musical "We Will Rock You" has nothing to do with Queen. It doesn't even have anything to do with Sweden (it's set on a Greek island, though I'm not wholly sure why), and even the 70s barely get a look-in. Mamma Mia is the sort of happy and wholly unlikely plot that gives cheese a bad name, a valiant if spurious attempt to get all the hits from Abba Gold plus the ones that that boy band covered into an a two-hour singalong fest with occasional if unnecessary six-packs and a few skimpy dresses thrown in for good measure. The basic plot is this: a 20-year-old, whose ageing single mother used to be some sort of singer so that the plot isn't clutching at straws so much when the songs come up later, wants to know who her dad is, and so rather than going on Jeremy Kyle and demanding a paternity test she invites the three possible fathers to her wedding, having found their names in her mother's diary, which has handily been hanging around for 20 years unguarded, and into which its author has non-discreetly apparently listed every sexual encounter she ever had. Presumably she meticulously wrote their addresses down too so the daughter knew where to send the invites, and in another happy twist of fate they never moved house, and clearly none of them have anything pressing to do back home, because they all obediently turn up on said Greek island as invited. Not only that, but they prove to be quite good at singing and dancing, enabling them to play a full part in what follows when their ex-lover, her two ageing sidekicks, possible daughter and for that matter all the inhabitants of the island start breaking into spontaneous choruses at opportune moments in the unfolding drama. We get Dancing Queen at the hen do (well they had to get it in somewhere) to Slipping Through My Fingers (as her daughter puts on the wedding dress) to The Winner Takes It All (when confronted by her old flame and possible father of her child from all those years ago). Even Waterloo featured, if only as an encore. The only one they didn't manage to work in was Fernando, which is a shame because it's my favourite, though it's probably just as well, because, knowing the lyrics, the plot would have had to go from spurious to utterly surreal for that to work.

The upshot of all this is that the daughter decides she's too young to get married, but that's OK, because one of her mum's blokes steps in with the line "Why waste a good wedding?" and he and Meryl Streep (or Linzi Hately in the stage version) get married there and then. Surprisingly the vicar, who seems to be inexplicably Anglican and either way not Greek Orthodox as one might expect, smiles jovially and goes right ahead as though this sort of thing happens every day - I'm sure in real life his bishop would have something to say about that. But then I'm sure in real life he would think it rather infradig to join in with the obligatory chorus of "I do, I do, I do", so let's just suspend our disbelief for a bit.

But anyway, despite - or because of - all of the above, it was simply brilliant. It was so utterly implausibly ridiculous that we were happy to go with it all, and anyway, Morrissey fan or not, you can't help but admit that Abba were something else - proper tunes, for a start, my mum would say. Great tunes, memorable lyrics, and enough fond memories of Discos Gone By (remember EYP 1998, people?!) to have people literally - and I use this in its correct sense - dancing in the aisles, clapping and singing along. Some in costume, but please be reassurred that this was going a little too far for me.

It's a rubbish plot - as I say, it would have been a lot easier to nick a hair off them all and run one of those DIY paternity kit tests, and would have involved a heck of a lot less singing and leaping across Greek beaches in anachronistic flares. But it's GREAT. You should see it. Please? It would make me feel a lot less self-conscious at having had so much fun...