Musical perfectly honours fabulous music of the great Carole King

It’s called Beautiful and it really is – a superb celebration of the remarkable song-writing talents of the great Carole King.

In a sense, it’s three shows in one.

We get the story of King’s marriage and break-up with her song-writing partner, a self-centred and increasingly frustrated and remote Gerry Goffin.

We also get the tale of the Goffin-King rivalry with their great friends and fellow song-writers Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann (beautifully played by Seren Sandham-Davies and Jos Slovick)

But maybe above all, it’s the tale of Carole King’s emergence as not just a song-writer in her own right but as the most remarkable performer of her own songs after years of writing them for other people.

The night is framed by her solo Carnegie Hall performance – and as we come full circle Molly-Grace Cutler delivers an outstanding performance of genuine depth and virtuosity as King, rising fabulously to give full value to a succession of absolute classics.

Tom Milner’ s Gerry Goffin captures the man’s brilliance, charisma and troubles – and a terrific ensemble cast does the rest, a set of superlative actor musicians creating every note before our eyes.

The result is a scintillating night of rare quality.

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