By: Julia Aidan
Submitted: 2009-08-03 20:11:32 | Word Count: 716
Big Brother musical show received the award as 'the greatest musical of the decade' from The Society of West End Theater. Few musicals have received such a standing ovation from the audience, thereby lifting out more than four awards to its credit. As it is rightly said that the play, with the plot of 'nature vs. nurture', surrounds the twin brothers growing up in different economic and social environment, and culminates to a tragedy leading to the catastrophic death of both the brothers.
The play is set in Liverpool and the scene starts in the house of Mr. and Mrs. Lyons where Mrs. Johnstone works. Mrs. Lyons do not have any issue and since Mrs. Johnstone was pregnant and is about to give birth to twins, she lures her to hand over a baby, surreptitiously. As Mrs. Johnstone was poor and could not afford to upkeep more babies, she parts with one of the twins. Over the period of time Mrs. Lyons observed that Mrs. Johnstone is giving too much attention, to her adopted baby. Out of fear she sacks her and tells her that "if twins separated at birth learn that they were once one of a pair they will both immediately die".
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The time passes no and after seven years Mrs. Johnston's son Mickey meets His adopted brother Eddie. Both were shocked to meet each other and astonished to find that their birthday is same. They become blood brothers. But both the mothers realizing their meeting may be disastrous dissuade them from meeting each other. Both of them sneak out to play along with Linda, who is Mickey's friend. Mrs. Lyons gets anxious with there meetings and decides to leave the place to stay in the country-side. Eddie before departing gets a locket from Mrs. Johnstone with a picture of Mickey and hers engraved in it.
While we move forward to the second Act of the play we find that both the boys have become 13 1/2 years old. The living standard of Mrs Johnstone has improved. They have not seen Eddie since then and Mickey has developed a liking towards Linda, but couldn't express. Both of them were suspended from the school for ranting off their teacher. On the other hand Eddie was also suspended from the boarding for refusing to give up the locket of Mrs. Johnstone. On one occasion Mrs. Lyons cites Mrs. Johnstone near her house and is worried. Both the brothers bump into each other in a nearby field but could not recognize each other but finally recognize and meet with Linda.
Four and a half years after when they were eighteen years old, Mickey was fired from his job, which forces him to receive assistance from the State. He finds Linda is pregnant and decides to marry her. During Christmas Eddie returns but Mickey realizes that both are different and they part with each other after a small fight. Mickey who is out of job and in dole, assist his brother in a robbery and gets caught as an accomplice to serve seven years imprisonment. In prison Mickey goes into depression and becomes a dependant on anti depressant drugs, which makes him turn away from Linda.
Eddie becomes a councilor and Linda gets in touch with him. They develop romance, which was noticed by Mickey who gets furious and takes a gun to shoot Eddie. The dilemma, which forced Mickey to do such an act, was the socio-economic environment. The thought that Eddie has everything and he has one good thing which Eddie wants to snatch away from him. Eddie denies the accusations. Mrs. Johnstone interferes in an attempt to stop Mickey and reveals the truth about them. Mickey curses his fate for not being given away to Mrs. Lyons, instead of Eddie. Mickey visibly perturbed, accidentally shoots Eddie and the police shot him. The superstitious prediction of Mrs. Lyons comes true. Conclusively, the Narrator questions, 'whether class was more to blame than superstition'.
The play proceeds with a quick pace, reaching a climax, through the interactions between the narrator and the characters. A hard to please audience of West End Theater is compelled to render a standing ovation, which is rare thing in Britain.
