The Beatles, football and popular culture

Inevitably, the Beatles have appeared on the stage of the Everyman – although only twice. Most recently, Bob Eaton’s Lennon (1981), staged less than a year after Lennon’s tragic death, had Mark McGann as the young Lennon who Eaton had spotted doing a Lennon impression in Ken Campbell’s The Warp the previous season. The first Beatles play, Willy Russell’s John, Paul, George, Ringo and Bert (1974), became one of the theatre’s biggest successes and transferred to London’s West End. It starred Bernard Hill as Lennon, Trevor Eve as Paul McCartney, Philip Joseph as George Harrison and Antony Sher as Ringo.

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Russell’s relationship with the Everyman didn’t start or end there. In 1973, he had re-written Alan Plater’s football-themed play When the Reds, shifting the setting from Hull and tracing Liverpool’s rise through 20 unbeaten weeks in 1949 to their 1964 FA Cup Final win. This was followed by Breezeblock Park (1976), Stags and Hens (1978), Our Day Out (1983) and Shirley Valentine (1985) where Willy Russell famously stepped into the leading role when Noreen Kershaw was taken to hospital with appendicitis (there had been no money for an understudy). In a twist, Philip Key’s Daily Post annual honours list, awarded Noreen Kershaw Best Actress and Willy Russell ‘Best Supporting Actress.’ Shirley Valentine will return to the Everyman in March 2025 to conclude the theatre’s 60th anniversary celebrations.

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For a football-mad city, the Everyman has staged surprisingly few plays about the beautiful game. Alongside When the Reds, which The Stage had noted with some surprise as the first play about Liverpool Football club, the theatre celebrated the 1984 International Garden Festival with Bob Carlton’s You’ll Never Walk Alone. The play featured the ghost of Liverpool manager Bill Shankly (who died in 1981) narrating the story of a search for an elusive Cup Final ticket. Nick Leather’s Billy Wonderful (2009) found the theatre decked out to resemble a derby day in Liverpool, the audience strictly segregated into red and blue. As the pre-match announcer put it: ‘There's no place for neutrals here.’ This modern parable explored the pitfalls of teenagers being offered thousands of pounds a week to play football, only to find themselves no longer on the team.

 

The Everyman’s inventive take on popular culture has ensured that, over the years, both Beatles fans and football enthusiasts can find a home on Hope Street.