Dear Evan Hansen UK Tour Review (Grand Opera House, York)

26 June 2025 I 19:30 I Grand Opera House, York

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

As Dear Evan Hansen prepares to conclude its first major UK tour, I feel incredibly privileged to have witnessed Adam Penford's non-replica staging, originated at Nottingham Playhouse. This modern musical enamours its audience with a contemporary spirit of 21st century teenage anxieties. Self-aware and vulnerable, Dear Evan Hansen is a fearless tribute to loneliness and the challenges in finding human connection.

Notionally conscious of its younger audiences, the narrative follows Evan Hansen, who becomes embroiled in a series of lies following the death of classmate Connor, a near stranger. Claiming to have been best friends, Evan's grief becomes highly mediatised, exploiting Connor's death to comfort a grieving family and gain social popularity.

Given the musical's moderately irredeemable protagonist and controversial plot, Steven Levenson's book is written with a hopeful and sensitive outlook to sympathise with Evan. His desire to belong is an attribute that all viewers can understand to varying degrees, and it pulls at the heartstrings. I was in tears by the end of Act One alone, in addition to much of Act Two. I have never reacted to a show quite this way before, emotionally charged and evocative. There is not a dry eye in the auditorium.

In turn, portraying the titular role, our empathy for Ryan Kopel knows no bounds in a candidly career-defining performance. His rendering of Evan is immensely well considered, innately personal to unlock an immediately accessible and natural character. To perform such believable emotion through song is a rare quality. Embodying the lyrics, identifying with every intention to result in a passionate and empathetic depiction.

Morgan Large and Ravi Deepres design an immaculate series of video screens, successful in their subtleties and dynamism. A highlight features in You Will Be Found, as a collage of social media screens erupt onto the stage. Broadcasting Evan's memorial speech, surrounding screens give an impression of community, as he finds comfort in online support.

Will Forgrave's Connor holds an authentically poignant presence, appearing in abstract sequences as a mouldable figure to shape around Evan's feigned memories. Forgrave demonstrates great versatility and comic charm in Sincerely, Me, progressing as a profound moral compass to evaluate Evan's principles.

A surreal set design from Morgan Large is visually sophisticated, lining the stage with an arrangement of mirrors and dirtied window panels that travel upstage. These allow the space to feel more expansive, with mirrors signifying the struggle of self-perception, and window panes returning to the motif of connection, and fighting to be seen as the ensemble vanish between the scenery.

The dynamic between Alice Fearn and Helen Anker's maternal characters is formidable, observing their generational struggle to protect their children in today's society. There is much gentle beauty within the margins, notably in Requiem as Lauren Conroy's Zoe delivers the score with such delicate precision. You don't just watch their lives onstage, you feel and immerse yourself within them.

Truthfully, I find that writing five-star reviews for the shows I adore to be somewhat challenging, in the sense of doing justice to such a powerful live experience. With music and lyrics from Benj Pasek and Justin Paul (under Michael Bradley's musical direction), the soundtrack is imbued with such a remarkable optimism. With each song adopting a metaphorical message on Evan's isolation, the writing is genius in this emotionally sweeping revival. Undoubtably one of 2025's greatest productions.