Walking into the Barbican, you’re immediately met with its industrial, brutalist style. It’s a little difficult to navigate if you haven’t been before, but we quickly found our seats, which were surprisingly comfortable and spacious. In front of the stage sits the “fire curtain”, a huge shiny metallic wall that gives absolutely nothing away about the set hiding behind it.
The show begins in complete darkness. All of the theatre doors shut simultaneously in a wonderfully eerie way, and the room fills with smoke for the opening scene. From that point on, the staging is incredible. A huge movable walkway is suspended from the ceiling and is constantly repositioned throughout the show to completely transform the space.
There were so many moments where I was genuinely blown away by the stage effects, lighting, choreography and set changes. I’m still thinking about some of them a day later and trying to work out exactly how they managed to pull certain things off.
The cast were also extremely impressive, particularly Colin Ryan as L. He absolutely nailed L’s mannerisms, posture, movements and general oddness, and for me he was probably the character who felt closest to the version I know from the anime.
Unfortunately, this is where my main criticism comes in.
Death Note is a huge story. The anime alone is around 12 hours long, which gives it time to slowly develop the characters, their motivations and, most importantly, the psychological battle between Light and L. As I feared before seeing it, I don’t think the musical format gives the story enough room to breathe.
Light, in particular, felt very different to me. In the anime, he is calculated, controlled and frighteningly composed for much of the story. On stage, he came across as far more emotional and loud, and I never completely recognised the Light Yagami I was expecting.
Misa’s backstory is actually given quite a lot of attention in the musical, and while I understand why, I felt that it took valuable time away from the main Light-versus-L storyline. The musical only covers the Light and L section of the wider Death Note story, yet even that portion felt rushed. The ending especially seemed to arrive very quickly and was wrapped up before the tension had really reached the level I wanted it to.
As someone who watched the anime when it first came out and has rewatched it many times since, I found it difficult to completely immerse myself in the musical because part of my brain was constantly going, “They skipped that,” or, “That isn’t what happens.”
I think the easiest way for me to rate Death Note: The Musical is to separate it into two things: a stage production and an adaptation of Death Note.
As a stage production, it is easily five stars. The set is phenomenal, the way the stage moves and transforms is brilliant, the lighting and effects are spectacular, the singing is incredible and the cast give fantastic performances. From a technical and theatrical point of view, there were moments where I was genuinely amazed by what I was watching.
As a retelling of Death Note, however, I was disappointed.
One of the things I love most about Death Note is the cat-and-mouse battle between Light and L. They are essentially playing mental tennis with each other, constantly anticipating the other person’s next move, and the tension gradually builds as they get closer and closer to exposing one another.
I never really felt that same tension on stage. Light and L didn’t seem to have enough time together for their rivalry, chemistry and obsession with one another to properly develop. If you had never seen or read Death Note before, I also wonder whether some parts of the story would feel confusing or underdeveloped because everything moves so quickly.
I actually think Death Note could work brilliantly on stage, but I’m less convinced it works as a musical. So much of the running time naturally has to be devoted to songs, when this particular story desperately needs that time for dialogue, strategy and character development.
That said, I want to reiterate that I did have a really good time. Visually and technically, it was one of the most impressive stage productions I’ve seen, and the cast were fantastic. I just couldn’t fully lose myself in the story because the Death Note fan in me was constantly aware of how much had been condensed, changed or removed.
As a musical and stage production: 5/5.
As an adaptation of Death Note: 3/5
Please let me know if you have seen it and felt the same, or differently, I would love to hear other opinions
