The Beautiful Game

A lot of prestige trails The Beautiful Game. Ben Elton wrote the book and lyrics – his first musical, preceding We Will Rock You by two years – and Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote the music. The musical is set in Belfast, Northern Ireland in 1969 during the early days of the political and religious conflict that would become known as The Troubles. 

It was a long, fractious and often very violent affair usually said to have reached its military stalemate in the late 1990s. It was still fresh in the public’s mind when The Beautiful Game launched in 2000, but a detailed understanding of contemporary Irish and British history isn’t necessary for digesting the solemnity of Elton and Lloyd Webber’s collaboration. 

The action centres on a Catholic boys' soccer team and a group of supporters. While they experiment with drinking alcohol and flirting like a regular bunch of young adults, the group also have to come to terms with how their aspirations may be affected by the growing violence.

Catholics are in the minority in Belfast and feel persecuted in their home country. Although some of the characters express unrepentant nationalism (in particular the IRA-affiliated Thomas), others simply want the conflict to reach a peaceful conclusion.

The Beautiful Game viscerally portrays the tension that was beginning to permeate Northern Ireland and shows how people were coerced into picking a side, even if they identified as atheist or found the whole affair to be doing more harm than good. 

Tens of thousands of civilians incurred serious injuries during The Troubles and Elton’s narrative doesn’t skim over this detail. Lloyd Webber’s music incorporates many Celtic tropes, and while the mawkish presentation of musical theatre hovers above the performance, the score is admirably varied and largely skirts cliché. 

The Beautiful Game illustrates how political divides can lead to pain and suffering – something we should take heed of during these disharmonious times.