A Night with Janis Joplin in the West End – review

In 2013, just over 50 years after she first started recording music, Janis Joplin was revived in A Night With Janis Joplin’s debut on Broadway, starring Mary Bridget Davies as Joplin. Now, a decade later, both the show and Davies have made their way to the West End, and it really makes for a night that’s been worth the wait.

Over the course of the evening, Davies’ (impeccable) Joplin sings, of course, and talks us through her (Joplin’s) musical life, her inspirations and artistry, and what the blues means to her. Alongside Joplin classics, we also hear from her inspirations themselves, in dreamlike sequences featuring such icons as Aretha Franklin, Nina Simone, and Etta James.

Somewhere on the scale between a biographical musical and a tribute act; and between a chat in someone’s lounge and a rock concert, it’s not always quite clear what A Night with Janis Joplin is trying to achieve. To a certain extent though, it simply doesn’t matter – it’s hugely fun, and gives us exactly what it says on the tin. Surreal as it might be, sat in the Peacock Theatre in 2024, we really could be at a Janis Joplin gig in the 1960s. Despite the more glamour than rock theatrical setting, the audience are regularly brought to their feet, clapping and dancing along throughout the show.

With very little plot to keep the narrative going, it depends almost entirely on the showmanship of its performers and band – and, thankfully, they absolutely deliver. As mentioned, Davies’ Joplin is almost unnervingly convincing. She oozes star power, and knows how to both own the stage and share it gracefully, lifting up her band and the rest of the cast, who are both “Joplinaire” backing singers and fill in as her heroes. Danielle Steers’ double role as Bessie Smith and Odessa shows her incredible range, and Kalisha Amaris brings the house (appropriately) down as Aretha Franklin, bringing Joplin onstage with her in a particularly unmoored but delightful moment.

The roles cast around Davies do bring up an interesting angle that the show, however, never really explores. Joplin, as Davies puts it early in the show, is a “white girl obsessed with the blues”, and as such, all of her musical role models are Black women. It feels like an intriguing aspect the show could delve into more, and seems like a missed opportunity. 

But again, it’s the power of the performances, and the dedication of the production to making the night with Janis Joplin real, that allows it to sort of get away with this. We can just believe in the music itself, and that’s the real power of the show – to provide a setting in which Janis Joplin’s blues can be the star.