The reviews are in for Thelma & Louise: A New Musical, the world premiere staging of Callie Khouri’s Oscar-winning road movie, which opened at the Young Vic on 16 September with a score by the alt-country songwriter Neko Case and Trip Cullman directing. Fourteen notices in, the critics are unanimous about exactly one thing: Amy Lennox and Rachel Tucker are the reason to go, and several reviewers say plainly that the two of them are better than the material. Where the notices part company is over the score and the staging. Penny Walshe and Jonathan Baz find the adaptation faithful and moving; Sarah Crompton and Arifa Akbar find the songs generic and the production static, and almost everyone raises the same objection — that a road movie has been staged without a road, or a car.
The verdict: fourteen reviews so far — four four-star notices, eight three-star, one two-star, and The Times behind a paywall with no rating visible. Across the thirteen that score it the average is 3.2 out of 5. Every one of them praises Amy Lennox and Rachel Tucker; the disagreement is about Neko Case’s score, which two critics call soulful and most of the rest call repetitive and unmemorable.
What are critics saying about Thelma & Louise: A New Musical?
London Box Office
Reviewer: Stuart King
With some fine ensemble work from the cast (which includes Jack Butterworth, Alex Gibson-Giorgio and Letitia Hector) the bar scenes with their raucous mix of pick-ups, fights, and line dancing, occupy the eye in director Trip Cullman’s production. Meanwhile the book by Callie Khouri and songs written by Neko Case provide an unmistakably southern feel which is less musical theatre and more raw-indy-rock-meets-moody-ballads in style.
The overall effect is a solid and occasionally charming musical which eschews whimsy in favour of real life jeopardy, and is a female buddy tale which comes close to emulating the shenanigans of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Even the final exhilarating moment which patrons will undoubtedly remember from the film, is theatrically achieved, without need of the famous Ford Thunderbird Convertible.
Theatre and Tonic
Reviewer: Penny Walshe
Whilst this is perhaps not a traditional musical, it’s a faithful and well structured adaptation of a much loved modern classic film, with music that doesn’t overwhelm or distract from its original story. At its heart, it’s a story of female empowerment centred around an unbreakable bond between two ordinary women who shake off the “good girl” personas expected by society in favour of taking control of their lives and destinies. It’s funny, emotional, uplifting and defiant – with two phenomenal performances from its brilliant Thelma and Louise.
Jonathan Baz Reviews
Reviewer: Jonathan Baz
It’s a fair transformation of the tale that sees Amy Lennox and Rachel Tucker playing the titular protagonists, and it is within their performances that much of Case’s songwriting shines. Lennox defines Thelma’s journey of sexual and emotional emancipation, while Tucker peels away the layers of Louise’s carapace to reveal a deeply damaged woman. As Tucker sings of her character’s back story beneath a starlit desert sky, the moment is profound and powerful.
But there are times when the stage show falls short of the brilliant original. While Lennox and Tucker are an inspired choice to replicate the movie’s Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon, casting the (talented) Trevor Dion Nicolas as Hal, the cop on the women’s tail and a role originally played by Harvey Keitel, is less successful, not helped by a thinly written sub-narrative involving his wife and daughters.
WhatsOnStage
Reviewer: Sarah Crompton
The music is generic rock, the lyrics do little to elevate ideas and are tiresomely repetitive. Some songs are lively, but none are memorable. There is a rich and varied band playing, and just occasionally when a country twang enters the score, there’s a sense of a what the writing could have been, but then it gets flattened by the latest heavy rock riff powering along the blacktop.
Cullman has made the bold choice to stage the entire show in a slightly grim, brown bar (designed by Christine Jones and Brett J Banakis) that only once opens up – to reveal a surprisingly crudely painted scene of the Grand Canyon at the story’s climax. This has the virtue of simplicity, but does mean that for a story of adventure, set on the road, there is no movement.
The Standard
Did this need to become a musical?
Reviewer: Nick Curtis
Both Lennox and Tucker sing with subtlety and power – Louise’s wrenching solo about what happened to her in Texas is a transcendent moment, which finds an answer in Thelma’s sweetly bolstering Make It Up To You. The band, above the stage, is tight.
And all together, this is, you know… fine. But beyond a wish to further commercially exploit a piece of existing intellectual property, the translation of a work of art – particularly a treasured, iconic one – from one format to another needs to have an animating principle. Did Thelma and Louise need to become a musical? No.
Time Out
This musical adaptation of the feminist thriller is enjoyable but really needs to step on the gas
Reviewer: Andrzej Lukowski
It doesn’t quite work though, in large part because it doesn’t make a convincing argument for why this story needs this treatment. Not to say there shouldn’t be a Thelma & Louise musical. But I think Khouri and co could have done more with the medium than offer up the exact plot of Thelma & Louise (the film) with songs bolted on.
LondonTheatre.co.uk
Amy Lennox and Rachel Tucker are outstanding in this ode to friendship
Reviewer: Julia Rank
Stepping into Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon’s boots, Lennox and Tucker both have outstanding stage presence and do a sterling job as Thelma and Louise respectively, with the pair’s chaotic friendship the driving force of the piece. Lennox’s Thelma is delightful as her repressed wild streak is given full rein, and she gets many of the most vibrant musical moments, in which her energy is as frizzled as her perm. Tucker is tough yet vulnerable in the comparatively understated role of the more grounded, guarded Louise, who has her own secrets and delivers a painful revelation towards the end.
Theatre Weekly
Reviewer: Greg Stewart
What is entirely new, of course, is the score from Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Neko Case. Unsurprisingly, the songs draw heavily from country and western influences, complemented by choreography from Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber that frequently leans into line dancing and Americana imagery. While many of the numbers work well in isolation, Case’s lack of musical theatre experience is difficult to ignore.
The score is dominated by ballads which, although often attractive to listen to, begin to blur together. As a result, the pacing suffers, particularly in the first act, which feels considerably longer than it is. The show is not conceived as a sung-through musical, yet there are moments when relatively ordinary exchanges are underscored for no obvious dramatic reason. Rather than heightening the storytelling, these songs often slow it down.
WestEnd Best Friend
Reviewer: Cara Brazier
With a powerful story, and an absolutely stellar cast, there is much to like about Thelma and Louise, with moments which really deliver a sucker punch of emotion, but despite the best efforts of the book and cast, that emotional momentum is often interrupted by a song which doesn’t always fit.
Remaining as important today as it was the first time around, this exploration of the female experience is a true love letter to friendship, identity and hope. Despite some unevenness in its musical adaptation, this adaptation of Thelma and Louise brings this iconic work to a new generation, celebrating a story of freedom and self-discovery that continues to resonate today.
All That Dazzles
The hotly anticipated musical stage adaptation of the classic has moments of brilliance but suffers from being in the middle of nowhere at other times
Reviewer: Daz Gale
With any musical adaptation of a classic movie, there is always the argument that the songs need to either seamlessly fit into the story or move it forwards in some way. There are times when the songs seem shoehorned when a good movie musical should find the right balance between the book and music to create the sweet spot. Sadly, this is where Thelma & Louise falls short. The music by Neko Case is solid to an extent, but it is the lyrics that let it down. There is an overreliance on repetition with lines said multiple times back to back on numerous occasions in the songs, feeling as if the repeat was a placeholder for another lyric that never came. This comes across as almost unfinished, letting down what could otherwise have been much better songs.
LondonTheatre1
Reviewer: Chris Omaweng
As far as the story overall goes, it is largely faithful to the motion picture. But there were no memorable songs to speak of, or even lyrics therein. It is perhaps too harsh to say the talent on stage was wasted, but I can’t help thinking a cast of this calibre deserved better material. Some judicious pruning to turn this into a ninety-minute interval-free show might have made this show more engaging. There are standout performances from Amy Lennox and Rachel Tucker to be enjoyed. But I ultimately struggled to maintain interest in a show that was very run-of-the-mill, nothing less and nothing more.
The Guardian
Musical hoedown is a bland and baffling wrong turn
Reviewer: Arifa Akbar
Under the direction of Trip Cullman, the characters seem dated and the time-frame wavers uncertainly between the 1980s and now. Bobbi Jene Smith and Or Schraiber’s choreography brings hoedown moves and line dancing men in 10-gallon hats. There are few memorable songs in Neko Case’s country score, although one reprised number takes flight in the heartfelt It Was Worth It. The southern twangs are dialled up to 10, and lyrics offer exposition with plodding lines, although the singing is strong.
Production photographs by Helen Murray.
Also reviewed by: The Stage (Holly O’Mahony, four stars, “Scorching with charisma”) and The Times (“Slow pace makes heroines seem like hitchhikers”), whose reviews sit behind paywalls. The Stage’s rating is counted in the average above; The Times publishes none that we could read.
More press nights, more notices: we have also gathered the reviews for Golden Boy at the Almeida Theatre and for Darkling at the Bush Theatre, and the rest of the week’s openings are on London Theatre Reviews.
Thelma & Louise is booking at the Young Vic until Saturday 24 October 2026.
