“We wrote it straight down to Tesco sandwiches and anxiety attacks!” How the ground beef process conquered the world | Musicals

nAtasha Hodgson wonders what to do with all the straight women she likes. Or, to put it more accurately, all the straight women who fell in love with her when she dressed as a World War II naval intelligence officer and spoke in a silly voice. But is it really the Hodgson this woman has fallen for? Or is it Ewen Montagu, the bombastic, braces-wearing war heroine she plays in the hit musical Operation Mincemeat?

“The confusion is real,” Hodgson says. “These women come to the show thinking they’re straight, and then have a complete identity crisis. But hey, if that’s not the purpose of musical theater, I don’t know what is!”

Challenging audience members’ sexuality isn’t the only thing that attests to the power of Operation Mincemeat. Since it premiered in 2019, the show has evolved from a quirky fringe comedy into a smash hit on both the West End (it’s been on sale for three years and counting) and on Broadway (now in its fifth run). It has received rave reviews and its fans include Robert De Niro, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, Steven Spielberg and Queen Camilla. One “Mincefluencer” (as superfans are called) loves it so much, they’ve watched it a staggering 201 times at the time of writing.

Next year, this delightful British success story will reach another milestone – embarking on a world tour, traveling to China, Australia and Mexico, as well as all over the UK. How it all happened is kind of a miracle. Because while Operation Mincemeat is undoubtedly brilliant, funny, moving, and sometimes amazing, all in one dance routine, the story it’s based on doesn’t exactly scream: “Hit the musical!”

The actual Operation Meatball – which also inspired a more traditional kind of war thriller in 2021 – was a piece of World War II shenanigans. MI5 took the body of vagabond Welsh worker Glyndwr Michael, who had died after ingesting rat poison, gave him a new name (Major William Martin), armed him with fictitious plans about an Allied invasion of Sardinia and Greece (Sicily was the real target), and deposited his uniformed body on a beach in Huelva, Spain, hoping it would reach German spies.

When I meet SpitLip – AKA Hodgson, David Cumming, Zoë Roberts and composer Felix Hagan – I don’t need to ask how they turned such unexpected material into comedy: these old friends from Warwick University have a warm, lively energy that can make any story funny. Cumming remembers the show’s first writing sessions, when they were so poor that they would “ride Mum Tash’s old exercise bike to keep warm because we couldn’t afford the heat!”

“All our friends were taking out mortgages and having kids, and we were living on Pret sandwiches and anxiety attacks,” says Hodgson. “Nice sandwiches?” Cumming says. “More like Tesco!”

After reading everything they could about the ground beef process, the group realized the opportunities were enormous. The Man Who Never Was, a 1953 book by the operation’s co-commander, Montagu, gave the impression that World War II, at least for some of Britain’s senior officers, could be a lot of fun. Then there was the dynamic between Montagu and the real brains of the operation, Charles Cholmondeley. The latter’s shy, obsessive personality and adherence to the rule book provided a perfect contrast to Montagu’s reckless disregard.

They realized that this didn’t have to be just a story about war. It could be a topical satire on Britain’s public school elites as well. As the opening number Born to Lead says: “Fortune favors courage / And fortune is what I’ve got!” There was also room to explore sadness, longing and feminism, with jokes about newt penises and raps about the Third Reich. “Goose step to the left, jump to the far right!”

Weaving all of this into three hours of singing and dancing was, of course, difficult. “We were thinking, ‘Maybe this verse isn’t as exciting as it could be,’ but then we realize that because we changed it, the whole play now undoes itself. So we have to start over,” Hagan says.

When it came to performing the show, it was clear that luxuries like a director, producer or choreographer were out of the question. In fact, they didn’t even have a practice mirror — Roberts remembers practicing one dance routine in the reflection of a framed poster on Cumming’s kitchen wall. Casting took place via Twitter: Jack Malone and Claire Marie Hall were cast, meaning they had a cast of five – along with Hodgson, Roberts and Cumming. The only problem was that their text was 82 characters long.

No problem – they’ll only take a dozen turns each! Casting sex went out the window. “Our rule of thumb was: ‘Who’s the funniest person?’” Roberts says. “Who has the dumbest voice? Who will look the dumbest in a wig?”

They soon realized that switching the character’s gender helped in interesting ways. “Montagu is an amazing mixture of the terrible and horrific things about men at the top of the food chain, but he also combines all the great things too – charisma and bubbly energy,” says Roberts. “We realized that if we cast a man for the role, it would be difficult to get people on his side. But by casting a woman.” [Hodgson]We have to make fun.

The same is true of Malone’s portrayal of Hester Leggatt, a demanding and rational woman who runs a tight ship as head of the trustees. The real-life Leggatt was commissioned to write a letter to Martin, supposedly from his fiancée, which was slipped into his pocket. The musical is based on lines from the actual letter of Dear Bill, a person crying about wartime separation. Malone would go on to win Tony and Olivier awards for his breakthrough performance.

Consequently, the show acquired a “quietly weird” subtext, delighting (and downright confusing) audiences along the way. A strong bond is formed between the cast and fans as the musical takes off. After successful runs in small and very small venues, the show made its West End debut, succeeding The Woman in Black at the Fortune Theatre. The fan base has intensified.

“We’ve learned from the West End run,” says Cumming, “that if someone asks you to autograph their arm, you should ask: ‘Is this going to be a tattoo?'” Roberts says: “That way we know how to write it well, and write it right.” “My favorite is to submit some fanfiction set in the 1970s week of The Great British Bake Off, where Charles is trying to get a pineapple upside-down cake when Monty joins him at midnight in the tent and… “Sex happens.”

Well, that’s the idea for your next musical!

“It brings families closer together,” Hodgson continues. “We got messages from people saying, ‘My dad and I weren’t really communicating. Then we went to see the show – and now we have planned a trip to Huelva.”

However, the most surprising act came when music enthusiasts tracked down Leggatt. For various reasons, including a spelling error in MI5 files, this woman who played such a crucial role in the war has never been identified. Then, in 2023, Leggatt’s great-nephew, Will, received an email from a chopper maker and all the dots were quickly connected. A book called Finding Hester followed and now the Fortune Theater has a plaque honoring Leggatt.

“That was amazing,” Hodgson says. “Inspiring history, inspiring art, history.”

Cumming: “By far the craziest thing fans have ever done.”

Hagan: “They should have talked to MI5!”

“And then they were able to tell family members, like, ‘That was your aunt!'” Cumming says.

It is a joy that the crew met relatives of the characters they portray. Hodgson even He hangs out With Montagu descendants. What on earth are they thinking, a rather mixed portrayal? “They love it!” says Hodgson. “Baffling!” Cumming adds. “They gave me one of his hats,” Hodgson says. “They’d say, ‘You’re part of the family now.’ They’re very proud of the story. They also have a great sense of humor, as you’d imagine, coming from this guy’s lineage.”

“We were always very aware that these were real people,” Cumming says. “We can’t lie about what they did. We can make them cartoonish. But we can’t change who they are in their soul. And I think we captured their essence — that’s why the family members didn’t sue us!”

As the fan base grew, the musical format changed. During Boris Johnson’s prime ministership, writers found themselves adding references to “whatever crazy thing he said that day” which kept things fresh. “Then people started telling us, ‘You know, there’s over 50 people working on this right now,’” Roberts says with a laugh. You can’t keep changing things.”

“It’s really unbelievable that we’re on Broadway, but our script keeps saying things like, ‘Hester gets in somehow,'” Hodgson says. “Big apologies to our directors and actors.”

When they were rehearsing with a meditation label, it’s safe to say that no member of SpitLip was thinking about Mincemeat arriving on Broadway. So when it happened earlier this year, they went together, moving to New York to perform there. Some critics wondered whether American audiences would enjoy the same British sense of humor – but this proved to be unfounded.

“In fact, we have a phrase that basically boils down to: ‘If people like us blindly followed orders, the fascists wouldn’t need to break down the door,'” Hodgson says. “They will have already won.” In London, the audience says, “Hmm.” In New York, there is tremendous applause.”

The move to America of course meant they had to recruit a whole new West End cast of miniature versions of themselves. “That’s what we call them!” Hodgson says. This brought its own challenges. “You have to make sure these people can fully transform into 30 characters,” Roberts says. “The package of tests we are sending out to these poor people is huge, because they could be the amazing Jean Leslie [the talented young woman from the secretarial department]“But if they can’t turn into an 80-year-old guy in Huelva, fiddling with the phone, it won’t work.”

Christian Andrews, who played many parts of Operation Mincemeat during its West End run, can attest to that. “It was very scary,” he says. “I felt the clown roles were very much in my wheelhouse, but the quiet Hester roles really challenged me. It was nice to be able to work that out for myself.”

Performing night after night is definitely exhausting. Ideas for a new show are “kind of a filter,” Roberts says, and at some point they’ll have to resort to those ideas. But whatever happens with the strength of Mincemeat, current shows, UK tour and global expansion, she believes SpitLip will remain fundamentally unchanged. “We’ll always be these four nerds with a box of hats and a dream, putting on a little show for people and hoping it goes well,” she says.