LISTEN: Think you don’t like musicals? One of Jersey’s top trial lawyers says you should think again

One of Jersey’s most experienced lawyers is on a mission to convince musical sceptics that the genre deserves another chance with a production drawing on a remarkable story arising from 9/11.

Advocate Simon Thomas, a partner at Baker & Partners who has spent three decades working on some of the Island’s highest-profile legal cases, is currently swapping legal submissions for stage directions as director of the acclaimed production Come From Away at the revamped Jersey Opera House.

In a Bailiwick Podcasts interview during performance week, Advocate Thomas spoke about the parallels between the courtroom and stage, doing justice to real-life stories, musical misconceptions, and if there’s any truth in the old cliché that “all barristers are failed actors”…

“I think they often get a bad press”

“I think they often get a bad press, don’t they?” he said.

“People say, ‘I don’t like them because someone will be speaking and then they suddenly burst into song.’

“But the best musicals – ones that are really well constructed – have got a very particular way of telling a story and a very particular way of showing character development. They’re not just plays with songs scattered into them.”

Instead, he said, the music itself becomes part of the storytelling.

“It’s the way that a musical can tell a story and invoke that emotional reaction because it has the benefit of music, which, when well written, can really create, almost without the audience realising it, an emotion in them.” 

“All barristers are failed actors”

For Advocate Thomas, whose legal career in recent years has included involvement in the L’Ecume II collision case, storytelling is also what links the courtroom with the stage.

“When you say you’ve an interest in theatre as a lawyer, people say, ‘All barristers are failed actors’,” he laughed.

“I think actually that’s not the key similarity… What does translate is storytelling.

“It’s being able to present something clearly to an audience which may not be familiar with it… and I think the same thing is true of directing.

“You have to make sure they get exactly what you want them to see… You almost hold their hand through what you’re trying to present.”

“A really genuine portrayal”

The production tells the true story of almost 7,000 airline passengers who were diverted to the tiny Newfoundland town of Gander after US airspace closed following the 11 September attacks, doubling the local population overnight.

Thomas said staging a production based on real events brought an added responsibility.

“The first thing that I did once we got the licence for the show was read the actual accounts… and get to know some of these people,” he said.

What’s impressed him most, however, has been seeing cast members undertake their own research into the real people they portray.

“The cast independently have been coming to me with stories and snippets that they have read about the particular character they’re playing,” he said.

“That’s been really important because now you can see, as you watch the performance, how that research and effort comes through in a really genuine portrayal.”

Remarkable details

He also revealed one remarkable detail hidden within the production.

The musical opens at 7.30pm, and one of its pivotal songs reaches the lyric referencing the terrorist attacks almost exactly at 8.46pm – the moment in the morning that the first aircraft struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

“The authors of this show… have timed the script so that, if we start at 7.30pm, at 8.46pm that line is sung,” Thomas said.

“I thought that was just impossible… but that’s something in the way the musical is written that shows what care and what detail the authors have put into it.” 

“You can imagine Jersey people… really rallying around”

Although rooted in one of history’s darkest days, Advocate Thomas believes Come From Away is ultimately about kindness and community – themes he thinks resonate strongly in Jersey.

“We’ve all been thinking about examples of how Jersey has rallied round,” he said, recalling how Islanders recently came together to support a bride-to-be after the recent laundrette fire.

“Similarly, you can imagine if people were suddenly landed in St Helier. There’s no doubt people would be opening their doors, taking them in…

“You can imagine Jersey people, Jersey businesses really rallying around.”

Asked what he hoped attendees would come away with after watching the production, he said: “I hope they’ll come away having seen something different.”

“If they’re not people who go to see musicals all the time, they’ll come away thinking, ‘Actually, I don’t mind musicals.’

“I think this medium can be so much more than the ones I’ve talked about earlier on… appreciating quite how much emotion and real feeling you can get through something that’s well written and well performed.” 

And, Advocate Thomas joked, if you’re still not convinced, there is excellent air-con in the Opera House for those seeking to escape the next heatwave…

DON’T MISS…

Come From Away runs until Saturday 11 July and tickets can be purchased here.