Live To Tell: (A Proposal For) The Madonna Musical to premiere with Off West End tour

Brian Mullin’s Live To Tell: (A Proposal For) The Madonna Musical will make its world premiere this spring.

The production will tour Off West End venues Omnibus Theatre (7 – 18 February) and Camden People’s Theatre (4 – 15 April).

Brian Mullin will play the self-inspired role of Brian with Dan de la Motte playing all other characters. Nadya Ginsburg (2 Broke Girls, RuPaul’s Drag Race) provides the voice of Madonna.

Deirdre McLaughlin directs with sound design by Josh Anio Grigg and lighting design by Alex Thomas. The producer is Steph J Weller for PlayWell Productions.

Live To Tell: (A Proposal For) The Madonna Musical follows the quest of Brian, a Madonna superfan living with HIV, as he pitches himself to Madonna to create a jukebox musical based on her songs, whilst also facing what it means in his own life to survive with HIV.

Living in a disabled body, Brian wants to reinvent himself — just like Madonna.

He can’t live to tell a tale of jukebox triumph until he confronts the stigma and side effects of long-term survival. Just like a prayer, this show will take you there.

Mullin said of his work: “Madonna is an icon of Reinvention. For 40 years, with every album or new look, she keeps changing herself and adapting in bold new ways. Even now, we’re told she’ll be on tour in 2023 reinventing her huge catalogue of hits. She’s also someone who’s been actively fighting to support people with HIV since the very onset of the epidemic.

“As someone living with HIV for ten years now, I’ve had my own fantasy of reinvention. When you’re feeling weighed down by daily medication and the experience of societal stigma, the dream of starting all over again is very powerful. Thanks to medication which is freely available on the NHS, I’m able to live a long and happy life. The medical breakthrough of U = U means that people with undetectable HIV levels cannot pass the virus on to others, which is incredible!

“Live to Tell is not really about Madonna, it’s about what she symbolises. Staying strong and surviving is her superpower, and that seems really appealing to a mere mortal like me! So in the show I pitch myself to Madonna to help her create a jukebox musical based on her songs. It doesn’t all go according to plan, and I have to face up to what it means in my own life to survive with HIV.”

For more information and tickets, visit www.omnibus-clapham.org/live-to-tell/ or www.cptheatre.co.uk.