Blood Brothers

 Blood Brothers

Blood Brothers Poster - Dark blue background, along the top in shiny capital writing reads Willy Russell's - then in red and capitals with shiny bits reads Blood, then in shiny capital B lower case for the rest of Brothers. Underneath is a circle - within the circle you can see a blue skyline with a red sunset sky, underneath are the arms of two men clasped together, below this is the skyline of Liverpool showing the Liver buildings which is an ornate brick building with two towers with Liver birds on each one - one looks out to the sea and one looks in to the city.

Beginning in 1950s Liverpool, Blood Brothers, written by Willy Russell, tells the story of Mrs Johnston, a heavily pregnant mother of many, whose husband has just left her. Working as a cleaner for the posh Mrs Lyons, Mrs Johnston and her children live in poverty. The doctor tells her she's having twins. Mrs Johnston discusses her dilemma with Mrs Lyons, that she can't afford to keep both of the twins...

The pair come to an awful agreement that will break both their hearts.

Mrs Johnston keeps Micky and gives Eddie to Mrs Lyons.

As the boys grow up in the small city of Liverpool, they become best friends and make a blood brothers pact.

As both lads fall for their childhood friend, Linda, Mrs Lyons worries Eddie is getting too close to Micky and the Johnston family and that he will discover the truth. In her paranoia she forces them to move away from Liverpool so that the boys will never see each other again.

Years later, the pair bump into each other. Can the two men ever be as close in adulthood as they were as boys? What will happen if they discover their mothers secret?

I am bias. I do love this play and have studied it at GCSE English. In my opinion, it’s got it all - a heart-breaking storyline of a mother's love that causes her to do the unimaginable, cheeky scouse humour and a serious undertone that's relatable in today's society.

The only reference that young people might not get is, when they use the phrase, 'just like Marilyn Monroe' (my friend took her 13-year-old daughter and some of the historical references went over her head).

Blood Brothers is one of my all-time favourite plays (see above why I’d call it a play with songs, rather than a musical). I contacted the Liverpool Empire Theatre and, as I saw no audio described date listed, I asked them to arrange one, which they did 😀👍.

Those of you who read my blogs regularly, will remember what a disappointing time I had at Beauty and the Beast when the audio description didn't work. I wrote to the manager, who said they were getting a new system in. I kept going to the theatre, in the hope that they'd sorted it, I kept writing to them, as they hadn't. Maybe they got fed up of my emailing, because in August this year, they invited me to test the new audio description system for Book of Mormon! Unfortunately, we were given the wrong date and I was in Manchester for the correct one.

Being honest, I didn't think the audio description would work, but our seats were in the middle of the wheelchair spaces and... It worked! I could hear the describers voice clearly, despite a little crackle every now and then, but it was ok and her voice came through quite clearly.

The man who gave us the headphones kept coming to check they were working, which showed excellent customer service.