No king, all queens in 'SIX'

This review by longtime Charlotte arts critic Lawrence Toppman was published by The Charlotte Ledger on November 5, 2025. You can find out more about The Charlotte Ledger’s commitment to smart local news and information and sign up for our newsletter for free here. Ledger subscribers can add the Toppman on the Arts newsletter on their “My Account” page.

by Lawrence Toppman

Had Henry VIII written a musical, he might have called it “One” and spent the entire time lamenting his intractable, homely, infertile, sickly and/or unfaithful spouses. Maybe he’d have thrown in snide comments about Pope Paul III for excommunicating him in 1538.

But as he stuck to drinking songs, carols and occasional pieces of holy music, we get “SIX” instead, where those half-dozen wives beg to be considered something more than marital appendages and provide with alternative views of their relationships with Big Hank. I’ve enjoyed the Broadway tour twice now within 30 months, and it improved with reacquaintance Tuesday at Belk Theater.

The premise still seems like the only flimsy thing about the 80-minute show. The long-gone wives — known by the summation “divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived” — compete to see who can tug most at our heartstrings with her narrative. (Weirdly, this parallels an American TV show of my youth, a pity party where suffering contestants won prizes. It was called … “Queen for a Day.”)

Jane Seymour can’t really compete in a weep-a-thon. She tells us she loved Henry and, had she not died of post-natal complications in her 20s, would happily have stayed with him. History suggests that’s true; she was the only wife to get a queen’s funeral, and he’s buried alongside her at Windsor Castle. Her tragedy is a short life, nothing to do with a short-tempered husband.

But the other five regale us with stories of neglect, abuse, the king’s Hanky-panky with mistresses, being torn away from a lifelong love (Catherine Parr) or cast aside after 24 years for failure to produce an heir (Catherine of Aragon). Katherine Howard’s “All You Wanna Do,” which seems at first like a party paean to great lovemaking, turns out to be a story of continual sexual abuse by older men. (Henry was 49 when they married; she was a teenager.)

Composer-lyricists Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss, who won a 2022 Tony Award for best original score, based the queens’ vocal stylings on identifiable pop stars, like Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Alicia Keys and Celine Dion. They have adroitly varied the musical flow, from bouncy pop numbers to power ballads to hip-hop. I especially liked the Latin-flavored arrangement of the solo for Catherine of Aragon, who comes from Spain.

Their research can be questioned; historians dispute whether Katherine Howard was raped. But their wit cannot, and the lyrics blend historical tidbits with clever puns and sharp social satire that may Tudor the uninformed. They’re not afraid to slow the pace for a tender ballad before rushing into a hilarious rave number titled “Haus of Holbein,” in which all the queens tease/praise German painter Hans Holbein for his romanticized portraits of royalty.

The use of an all-female, four-piece band, conducted from the keyboard by Valerie Maze, means no men can be found onstage. Perhaps Henry is “present” in excerpts from “Greensleeves,” which he was long believed to have written. (He didn’t.) Or maybe even that is a way for the authors to razz him: It’s another Henry myth ripe for busting, like many alluded to in the songs and dialogue.

In the end, the queens invent alternate realities for themselves. They’re freed of unwanted ties, long-lived and loved by Henry (in Jane Seymour’s case) or someone else, keeping good heads on their shoulders and making the most of their potential. Yet in a way, that’s unnecessary. We’ve already accepted them as individuals with complicated personal histories that go way beyond their shared spouse. They’re no longer just six wives but six interesting women.

“Six” runs at Belk Theater, 130 N. Tryon St., through Nov. 9 at 7:30 Wednesday-Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday, and 1:30 and 7 p.m. Sunday. The 2 p.m. show Saturday is sold out.

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Lawrence Toppman covered the arts for 40 years at The Charlotte Observer before retiring in 2020. Now, he’s back in the critic’s chair for the Charlotte Ledger — look for his reviews several times each month in the Charlotte Ledger.

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