Theatre review: Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home at the Young Vic — a sapphic graphic treat

A moving musical survey of a queer family life

The Sunday Times
Torments and transports: Kaisa Hammarlund as Alison
Torments and transports: Kaisa Hammarlund as Alison
MARC BRENNER

The Inheritance was an exuberant, tragicomic queer history about legacy and identity at the Young Vic. Matthew Lopez’s two-parter has achieved a West End transfer. Fun Home, an unlikely musical version of Alison Bechdel’s graphic (and sapphic) novel and memoir, should too.

It’s a measure of the Young Vic’s canny programming that the two shows — both Stateside hits — don’t just tick the “gay play for everyone” box, but speak to each other in hugely necessary ways. The Inheritance, a splendid descendant of Angels in America, was devoid of female characters except for Vanessa Redgrave, who popped up as the representative of straight white women everywhere. Fun Home feels like more of a milestone in musical theatre (and mainstream, main-stage theatre generally), in that