From rebel to icon: Sylvia returns, reclaiming a radical historyMusicals are rarely accused of understatement, but Sylvia has always been doing something more pointed than spectacle. Instead of centring parliamentary milestones or maternal authority, Sylvia focuses on the movement’s most awkward presence: the daughter who refused to fall in line. Opposite her, Sharon Rose’s Sylvia is restless, searching, and unwilling to separate feminism from economic justice. Fuelled by a score that blends hip hop, funk and soul, Sylvia refuses the sonic cues of heritage theatre. It was also the place that banned Emmeline Pankhurst and the Women’s Social and Political Union in 1913, following the escalation of militant tactics.