PETE TOWNSHEND sees no particular reason why his story of Tommy the deaf, dumb and blind pinball champion should not easily transfer into the theatre even if the subject matter might seem unusual material for the basis of a West End musical.

He says: “Tommy was always the Who's best piece of theatre anyway, and my feeling about long-running musicals is that it all depends on the finale and whatever it is that you leave the theatre with.

“I don’t think the subject matter has ever been that important and to me Tommy is a finale that goes on for two hours.

“In fact, it is also a multi-layered story and the deeper stuff is there if you want it, but I’m not sure the average person who walks into a theatre is going to care that much.

“When you have the colourfulness of a musical with girls wandering around in black underwear and so on it is hard to think about much beyond it.”

Tommy has been synonymous with the Who now for more than ten years, first through a double album and then as a film directed by Ken Russell.

Even though Townshend has described it in the past as a millstone around the group's neck he is taking an active part in the production of the musical version and the group have provided the £250,000 that is required to put it on.

He also admits that when he wrote the piece in 1967 it was at a crucial time for both the group and himself.

“The group was known as a singles band, Ready Steady Go institution, but we’d just about come to the end of the line. I felt that what was needed was something a bit special, a bit grandiose and the result really was Tommy.

Last ditch

“You could say that Tommy was at the time the last ditch attempt by the Who to throw everything in, which meant you had plane crashes, the First and Second world wars, LSD trips, spirituality, drugs, violence and Jesus Christ, all rolled into one piece.

"It was also written as a kind of crisis point for myself as a writer because I’d previously depended on drugs and God knows what else to get kicks. I had then stopped, and I felt life was going to become very grey.

This production of Tommy is Townshend’s first experience of working in a theatrical field even though some years ago the Who had hoped to produce a musical with the Young Vic.

“I’ve always been attracted to working in the theatre and the Who have always had a strong, flamboyant stage consciousness.

“The strange thing I’ve found is that when you try to do something experimental on stage as a group in front of an audience, in the end you still somehow get the traditions of good theatre coming into it.

“Yet, the difference between working in rock and theatre, I’ve found, is incredible. At a rock concert it is the music that is selling the seats and therefore the sound is the first priority.

“But we brought a couple of rock sound people in to do this show and to be frank they couldn’t stand the strain of 50 other things going on around them.

“While they were trying to check the microphones somebody else would want to be painting the floor black and somebody else would be yelling for silence and then the tea lady would come and they just couldn’t handle it.

Happy

The production of Tommy that goes on show tonight originated from the Queens Theatre in Hornchurch. Townshend was originally unenthusiastic about the idea of a stage version of the piece, but he offered help and money after he had seen the original show.

“If the Who had staged it ourselves it would probably be quite different. We’re quite happy to see it there at the theatre, but it’s not something that has come from our own volition. I suppose we’ve simply bowed to the apparent demand for it to go on.”