“If you’re as famous as him, you don’t ever need to stop…” announces the voice-over that introduces not just one man but THE Man that anyone who has ever interacted with the musical theatre world would recognise—Andrew Lloyd Webber. 

Known for extravagant mega-musicals featuring dancing cats, crashing chandeliers and a literal musical on roller-skates, his name speaks for itself. One Man Musical is a long-overdue egomaniacal one-hour self-celebration of the One Man who both rescued and ruined musical theatre.

Presented as part of the 2025 Melbourne International Comedy Festival, One Man Musical in its marketing made no mention of the One Man’s name, simply calling him “an icon of the musical theatre world” who “finally turns the spotlight onto the one story he's yet to tell: his own.”

But walking into the theatre it makes complete sense that this show would be about none other than THE Andrew Lloyd Webber (ALW).

Created by musical comedy duo Flo & Joan and brought to life by the talented HBO’s The Franchise star George Fouracres under the careful direction of Georgie Straight (Operation Mincemeat), One Man Musical humorously satirises the rise and fall of ALW. Stripped of his usual extravagance, this show is only accompanied by a two-piece band starring Flo and Joan. A rack of discarded props and costumes—relics—from his past shows makes up the set. This is an ALW that has long passed his peak and is now reminiscing his bygone glories.

The show features a soundtrack of distinctly musical theatre sounding songs that poke fun at itself. Beginning with the egotistical upbeat ‘A Show About Me’, this I Am Song traverses all the tropes associated with musical theatre. From hysterically dramatic emotional ballad to big belts, bold twangs, and even a one-line reprise, the opening number created a hilariously ridiculous mishmash that musical fans will recognise right away.

This is followed by a series of songs that time-travels across the years and pay homage to ALW’s successful works. The club-style dance song ‘PUSSY’, performed by Fouracres wearing a cat collar with bells, traced his Cats years. The name of the show apparently takes origin from the initials of his new collaboration team, Cameron Mackintosh, Andrew and Trevor Nunn—CAT. ‘No One Says No to Andrew’ paints a caricature of ALW attempting (and failing) at roller skating. While he moves robotically across the stage, ALW makes sure to blame his own poor skating skills on the Melbourne backstage staff, who’s lack of support is surely personal (and would never be directed at Sondheim!). The notorious ‘Fantom of the Opera’ is another highlight—the song is smartly named by ALW as Fantom with a ‘F’ to avoid any potential charges of self-plagiarism!

Across all these numbers, Fouracres delivers an animated performance of ALW in this fast-paced show that aptly captures the extravaganza and excess of ALW’s personality against a minimalist stage and bared down band—things ALW would have hated but are increasingly characterising contemporary musical theatre. The musical is interspersed with elements of comedy that fuses together the two genres quite cohesively.    

While minimalist, great attention has been paid towards the small details within the show design. From cat paw slippers in the finale to piano socks, from the mini grand piano prop to the rainbow lighting that flashes across the theatre during the Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat scene, the audience are not just watching but are entirely immersed in the world of ALW. The stage is littered with motifs from his past shows. A particularly favourite costume of mine is the sparkly gold costume Fouracres wears at the very end of the show that is not only gorgeously stunning to look at, but also perfectly captures ALW – shiny, glittery and flashy, going out on a bang.

The voiceover of the ‘Fantom’ is also a highlight, cutting across ALW’s celebration finale to remind him that this is not the end. Accompanied by rapidly switching orange and blue lighting to match the switches between the Fantom and Andrew, the brilliantly one-man-performed confrontation on Andrew’s legendary status. This scene features masterful acting and direction that is highly commendable. 

The inevitable decline and fading of a stellar career are a challenge all artists must confront and many fears. After a string of hits ALW seemed to have reached his peak with The Phantom of the Opera as the Fantom accusingly remarked. As ALW commented in an interview on the I Never Thought it Would Happen podcast attributing political correctness to the reason hindering him from creating another hit. As well, ALW has expressed disappointment at the music of recent successful musicals declaring that “the last musical that had really good songs in it was Wicked”.

This show satirises ALW's desperate tone-deaf attempt to stay relevant by creating a new 'woke' musical in the finale, portraying his inability to keep up with cultural change. While this portrayal is humorous and entertaining, it did come across as slightly out of character for ALW to suddenly resort to creating the ‘politically correct’ musical the real ALW despises.

Instead, it would have been nice to see a depiction of ALW satirising the popular musicals of the day and giving his piece of mind on the shifting tastes in musicals emerging post-2000s. Alternatively his desire to regain the spotlight might result in him calling for a MT revolution, a much-needed revival of the ‘golden era’ of mega-musicals to fix the ‘rot’ that fills up Broadway today. He might even make a fun jab at Donald Trump’s strong favouring of his shows by making a parody declaration of “make musical theatre great again!”

One Man Musical is a delightful made-to-order comedy for the musical theatre enthusiast. This is ALW stripped down to its barest but full of exhilarating energy, and a bio-musical both ALW fans and other audiences will love.