Let’s keep it a hundred: the block is hot, and we ain't just talking about the summer heat. While regular people are trying to survive inflation and rising utility bills, the theater world is trying to figure out how to talk about the climate crisis without putting everyone to sleep. The latest trend hitting stages from Edinburgh to London is a whole new wave of 'climate musicals' that are trying to use comedy, messy relationship drama, and queer cabaret to make people care about the planet.

The main show leading this push is Hot Mess, a new musical created by Jack Godfrey and Ellie Coote. It just finished up a big run at the Edinburgh Fringe and is now playing in London. Instead of giving you a boring science class, they decided to write a story about a toxic relationship we’ve all seen in real life. Earth is played by Danielle Steers as a ride-or-die single woman with a lot to give, and Humanity is played by Morgan Gregory as that smooth-talking, charismatic bad boy who turns out to be a straight-up user. It’s a wild analogy, but it connects because everyone knows what it’s like to deal with a selfish partner who takes and takes until there’s nothing left.

The crazy part is, the creators spent six whole years working on this show. They admitted that at first, the play was way too serious and academic. But they quickly realized that if you start lecturing people right out of the gate, they’re going to tune out completely. Coote explained that their main goal was to 'disarm' the audience with jokes and emotional drama so the message could slide in naturally. Godfrey, who wrote the lyrics, kept things clever by writing songs with double meanings that talk about environmental science and relationship drama at the same time.

This movement is getting so organized that some folks are trying to turn it into a real business. Finlay Carroll, the assistant producer of Hot Mess, went ahead and started a production company called Pollinate, which is strictly about putting on climate musicals. Carroll is pushing back against anyone saying you can't have fun while talking about serious stuff. He pointed out that classic theater has always dealt with heavy trauma, mentioning that Les Misérables is packed with tragedy and struggle, so there’s no reason musicals can’t tackle the environment too.

And it's not just Hot Mess getting in on the action. The Royal Shakespeare Company is running The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, which is a real-life hustle story about a kid in Malawi who built a wind turbine out of an old bicycle to save his community from drought. Then you’ve got Bryony Kimmings doing a solo show called , and a New York folk-pop show called narrated by Jane Fonda. Even the big-budget West End show is getting on theme, literally throwing empty oil drums all over the stage to represent hell.