There’s a Bowling For Soup musical hitting London in November

Bowling For Soup-themed musical High School Never Ends will be putting on a “showcase performance” in London this winter.

The show – which has the pop-punks’ seal of approval – will hit the Golden Goose Theatre in Camberwell on November 12, with the aim of it then becoming a bigger, more established production following its wonderfully humble beginnings.

Indeed, creator – and Bowling For Soup fan – Owen B Lewis wrote High School Never Ends when he was at university back in 2018, and went on to put it on in Bristol following a successful crowdfunder. “We’ve had a fantastic audience reception and has attracted some really good reviews,” Owen tells us. “We’re really excited to be taking it to the Golden Goose, and are hoping this will be the next step towards making it bigger and more well-known. The band has formally approved the project and even did some promotion for the initial crowdfunder. We’ve got a lot of fans who know about it and haven’t had the chance to see it yet and fingers crossed the only way is up!”

Speaking about how he came up with the idea in the first place, Owen shares: “I’ve loved the band since I was a child and I’d had the idea for quite a long while beforehand, but when I was studying Creative and Professional Writing at university I decided to put my idea into action. I always felt the Bowling For Soup songs would fit well in a musical, both because they have great melodies and harmonies, and also because I feel Jaret Reddick sings like he’s talking directly to you. This helped me structure the characters and plotlines in the script around the songs.

“I became friends with Fiona Freeman who runs the Bowling For Soup fan page on Facebook. She helped me communicate with Jaret, who loved the idea and created some promotional material to help us to crowdfund the first show back in 2018. Since then we have put the show on a few times now on our own back, and the audiences at the shows have laughed and cried with the love of the story and the songs they recognise well.

“We were then put in touch with Michael Kingsbury who works at The Golden Goose. We are putting on a showcase performance this November, and very much hope that industry people will come and see the potential of this new musical and help us fund for a big production in the near future.”

The premise for High School Never Ends is as follows: “In 1989, 16-year-old Emily dumped her boyfriend Jaret. Now in 2008, neither of them has got over each other. A chance encounter causes them each to start reflecting on the past – but with work commitments, surprise illnesses and mid-life crises to contend with, will the reunion ever happen?

“Set in 2008 between Texas and Ohio, High School Never Ends the Musical is a comedic love story of two high school sweethearts who fall out, part for years, and then have the opportunity to start again when there is a high school reunion. It is a heartfelt tale to appeal to everyone who struggled throughout high school; and a life-affirming story for anyone who sometimes feels dissatisfaction at how life has turned out.

“A series of nostalgia-filled flashback scenes from the 1980s highlight the peculiarities of being a high school student – a sense of bewilderment that never truly leaves us when we move into the adult world. Sexuality, love, dreams, fear and lack of confidence are just some of the topics that High School Never Ends the Musical explores, as a strong cast of characters attempt to be true to themselves in a world that has proved itself deeply disappointing.”

Get your tickets now.

Read this: Bowling For Soup’s Jaret Reddick: Punk rock, perseverance and getting personal