'We Will Rock You' at Mirvish is a zero-star dumpster fire that proves rock 'n' roll is truly dead

“C-R-A-P,” he rants, chanting each letter of the word and spitting them out with an air of disdain. 

Even that, however, seems too mild of an insult to describe this flaming-hot mess of a production, now burning like a five-alarm fire at the CAA Ed Mirvish Theatre.

I, unfortunately, was caught inside. And as I stumbled out of the smouldering wreckage on Thursday night, gasping for air, I wasn’t sure what I needed first: a brain transplant or some facial reconstruction surgery to fix my jaw, which had been dangling open for the previous two hours and 40 minutes, in awe of this spectacular conflagration. 

I wish I could remember what exactly happened. Because I’d like to file a report with the fire department and get started on my statement of claim. But the events that unfolded were so incomprehensible and so vapid that my mind is awash with a fog of amnesia. 

Still, I shall make an attempt to recount what went down — if anything, for your sheer amusement. 

We’re supposedly in Las Vegas and the Earth is now known as Planet A.I., ruled by an advanced being of artificial intelligence named the Killer Queen (Maggie Lacasse). With the help of her henchman, Khashoggi (Patrick Olafson), she’s banned all forms of music except those created artificially. 

One day, however, a young student known simply as 5.3.0.8. (Callum Lurie) starts having visions and dreams filled with rock songs of ages past. Lyrics come to him out of thin air. And he soon starts calling himself Galileo. (Would it really be a Queen musical with a protagonist named Galileo?) 

He — somehow, though I don’t know exactly how — manages to escape his controlled society, joined by a fellow rebellious student whom he names Scaramouche (Paige Foskett).  

A few scenes later — again, I have no clue how we get to this point — the pair find themselves in the Wasteland, inhabited by those bohemians who live in a former Hard Rock Café. They’re led by a man named Ozzy (Peter Deiwick), sporting a long, voluminous head of hair like his namesake, Ozzy Osbourne. 

Turns out — oh how conveniently — that Galileo is the prophet whom those rebels have been seeking. And it’s he, they say, who will bring rock ‘n’ roll back to Planet A.I. 

In this production, by the Quebec-based company Gestev, director Steve Bolton has updated Elton’s original story from 2002. But Bolton hasn’t done anything to improve on the material. Instead, we’re still stuck with that same nonsensical story, now with the addition of cringeworthy references to TikTok and ChatGPT. 

To offer a sense of what a mess “We Will Rock You” is: The end of the first act randomly turns into an in memoriam segment, paying tribute to the great rockers of yore. Do Elton and Bolton know they’re writing a musical, not next year’s Grammys? 

Most other jukebox musical writers understand they’re not producing the next Pulitzer Prize-winning drama. They know audiences watch these shows just to hear the music. The assignment is simple: string together a semi-respectable plot that gets us from one song to the next. 

It seems, though, that Elton and Bolton didn’t receive the memo. Their scenes drag on for what feels like an eternity. Their idea of humour is trying to stuff as many famous song lyrics as possible into their dialogue. By the time the “Bohemian Rhapsody” lyrics start to drop, I felt like I was trapped in a never-ending fever dream. 

Bolton’s production is equally vacuous. I understand that he doesn’t have much to work with in terms of material. But for a show that wants to take aim at artificial intelligence and our hyper-online society, maybe he and his team shouldn’t use a digital set with videos that look like they’ve been spat out of ChatGPT? Talk about some unintentional irony. 

And let’s not even talk about the glow sticks handed out by the ushers and the audience participation. 

I was sincerely hoping Megan Brydon and Yannick Moisan’s choreography would swoop in and save the day. This is a rock musical, after all. The moves should explode on stage. But Jean-Marc Saumier’s set, with awkward risers upstage, handcuffs them. The result is choreography that resembles robots doing aerobics, plus one of the lamest fight scenes I’ve ever seen on stage. 

As for this young cast of Canadian actors, they’re certainly a talented bunch. And they all have pleasant pop voices. But it’s clear almost immediately that none of them possess the right kind of rock sound to do these Queen songs justice. 

I find it hard to believe that Bolton and Gestev could not find a single rock singer for this production of “We Will Rock You.” But maybe rock ‘n’ roll really is dead after all, as this musical wants us to believe.

That sure would be a pity. So, may I make a suggestion? Can we get real rock ’n’ roll back, please, and put “We Will Rock You” out of its misery instead? And just to be extra sure, I’ll leave a sign on this show: Do Not Revive.