No Horizon @ Underbelly

New musical, No Horizon, tells the story of Nicholas Saunderson, a young Yorkshire man born in the late 1600s. Contracting smallpox, Saunderson lost his sight as a young boy. In his teens, he realised a talent for science, entering Cambridge against his father's will, who said "There's limits, son!" Pushing past them in Cambridge he wowed Isaac Newton, all the while being anchored to his heritage by girlfriend Abigail, who moved from Yorkshire to be with him.

Billed as the Les Miserables of the North, writer Andy Platt has found a solid and enduring case study in Saunderson, a real life scholar with a genuinely touching story that will endure. 

Sadly, though, the promise of Saunderson's inspiring story is quickly usurped by formulaic staging and Louise Denison's directing which feels years out of date, so much so that at times the musical feels like pastiche. Bags and bags of narrative are projected onto the stage to tell parts of the story, rather than it being told by the characters. The rest of the direction is equally clunky. Ensembles awkwardly lump on and off stage and the actors are left with dreary narrative that simply serves to propel the plot, rather than engage us with empathy.

Without creative staging or any real choreography, Robert Cooper's admittedly catchy music is also left to falter. It's exposed by the lack of energy everywhere else and it's a real shame. Actors Samuel Reid (Nicholas), Sophie Bradley (Abigail) and George Griffiths (Josh) do a fine job too but it is sadly ironic that a musical about a revolutionary should be so stuck in the past.