 Over the course of nearly an hour Wannabes captures a slice of adolescent life as five seventeen-year-old girls from Manchester prepare for a Halloween fancy dress party, donning the personas of the Spice Girls. The premise is simple, but the execution is quietly profound.
As lashes are glued and lipstick applied, what begins as playful banter organically spirals into deeper conversations around race, class, sexuality, and identity. Crucially, these moments never feel forced or performative. Instead, the writing trusts its characters and audience enough to let complex topics emerge naturally from the rhythms of teenage conversation that are half-serious, half-joking, always brimming with subtext. The question of which girl plays which Spice becomes a spark for debate. Why must the only Black girl automatically be Mel B? Why does the queer character get relegated to Sporty when there’s no real personal connection there? These moments expose the subtle pressures still baked into Gen Z’s supposedly liberated world - the internalised roles they’re expected to inhabit, the contradictions in their progressive ideals, and the often awkward navigation of identity within friendship groups. That’s where Wannabes becomes particularly insightful: in its depiction of a generation that is hyper-aware of identity politics but not always equipped to wield that awareness with empathy or consistency. There’s a tension in how the characters talk about each other with a mix of passive aggression, half-masked jealousy, and raw honesty. Teenage girlhood is presented not as a bonding rite but a minefield. The looming spectre of change hangs over the group. With university on the horizon, cracks in the friendships begin to show. Exam results have drawn invisible class lines within the group revealing futures filled with opportunity for some and stagnation for others. The harsh truth emerges: for certain members of the group, social mobility may remain a distant dream, no matter how loudly they sing about girl power. Millie Hampson-May shines as Kiera, delivering a performance that encapsulates the heart of the play. As the group’s Ginger Spice draped in the Union Jack outfit, she embodies a familiar, often overlooked figure — the working-class young woman who holds everything together at home and lives for some respite from a tough home life. Hampson-May brings warmth and resilience to the role, capturing both Kiera’s fierce loyalty to her friends and the quiet heartbreak of someone who knows the system isn’t built for her. She’s the kind of girl Britain is built on that are steadfast, capable, deeply caring and yet the opportunities to thrive always seem just out of reach. Hampson-May, alongside a uniformly strong young cast, ensures those stories are not only told but truly felt. Between scenes, the lights fall and snatches of Spice Girls hits play out in darkness as the actors move about the stage. These transitions somewhat disrupt the flow of what otherwise feels like an unbroken snapshot of a singular evening. A tighter edit here might allow the naturalism and momentum to land even more imapctfully. For once, you’re more than happy to spend nearly an hour watching a group of girls apply their makeup! Lee Hutchison WANNABES Venue: Olive Studio at Greenside @ George Street Dates: August 6th to 9th Time: 1605 Tickets: www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/wannabes |
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