Everybody's Talking About Jamie ending spoilers (for the movie and the musical) follow.
After a delay of almost one year, the movie adaptation of much-loved stage musical Everybody's Talking About Jamie is now available to watch on Amazon Prime Video.
Based on the real-life story of Jamie Campbell who wanted to attend his prom in drag, it's the perfect movie if you want a joyous, emotional and celebratory way to pass two hours, whether you've seen the musical or not.
But if you have seen the musical, you'll notice that things have been changed up slightly when it comes to the story's finale. In case you haven't seen the movie or the musical yet, we're flagging for spoilers (even if we're not talking about some major twist or surprise reveal).
Watch Everybody's Talking About Jamie on Prime Video
In both the movie and the musical, Jamie is now Jamie New (a star-making turn from max Harwood). While some creative licence has been taken, it still largely tells the story of the real-life drag queen it's based on from Jamie setting out his dream through to the prom finale.
There's also the addition of Jamie's drag mentor Hugo Battersby (played by Richard E Grant in the movie), a former drag queen called Loco Chanelle who rediscovers his spark after meeting Jamie. It's through Hugo that the movie makes one significant change to the musical with the addition of a new song, 'This Was Me'.
The powerful song replaces 'The Legend of Loco Chanelle (and the Blood Red Dress)' and it explores the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s. In a neat touch, the role of young Hugo/Loco in this sequence is played by John McCrea, who originated the role of Jamie on stage.
Talking to Digital Spy, director Jonathan Butterell explained that the new song came from knowing the 'Ballad' song wouldn't work in a movie. It's why some other songs from the musical didn't make the cut as well, but otherwise the story remains the same from the musical.
Jamie shows up to prom in a dress, but is refused entry by Miss Hedge (Sharon Horgan) until his schoolmates push for him to be let in, which he eventually is. He encourages his bully Dean (Samuel Bottomley) to be nice for just one night and they walk into the prom together.
It's here where the movie takes a surprise turn away from the musical, which ends with a big prom sequence in a classic musical finale way. The movie does have a song-and-dance number at prom, but ends on a quieter note as we cut to the next day and Jamie is putting the bins out.
Even fabulous drag queens have chores to do, you know.
The reason it's such an unexpected low-key finale is that during filming, we'd seen the cast filming a huge parade sequence in Sheffield. It's where we got our first look at Richard E Grant in the movie, and it was a sequence being hyped up by star Adeel Akhtar in 2020 as something that "means so much".
When we saw the set photos, we assumed that it was going to be the big musical finale to the movie, but it actually only ends up in the credits – which could feel like a missed opportunity for fans.
It turns out that it was originally in the movie, but Butterell decided to go in a different direction. "That was the intention, for Jamie to arrive fully back in his community," he explains of the parade sequence.
"The exploration is: what is the ending? And wrapping up stories is a very complex thing. Jamie arriving at his prom and getting accepted at his prom and celebrating his prom – it felt like an ending. I also wanted to make sure that on a Monday morning, in a very ordinary way, the boy could turn up and put the bins out, and be himself.
"Actually, it felt like a way of finishing that film in a celebratory way, and putting it as part of the credits felt like you got the scale, you got the celebration. I think we hopefully get the best of all worlds."
And even though Richard E Grant feels "heartsore" for the extras that showed up on that day, only for the sequence to end up in the credits, he still has fond memories of hanging out with drag queens that day.
"It was a real day of celebration, and I just remember standing on that balcony with Anna Phylactic, Myra Dubois and Son of Tutu. I was in a velvet blue pantsuit with some amazing eye makeup, and absolutely torturously uncomfortable, yellow Jimmy Choo satin diamante heels," he recalls.
"I will never forget the agony of those. How any woman could pay thousands of pounds to be tortured to wear these in order for someone to notice their feet for five seconds, is completely beyond my understanding. That's my memory of the day."
Everybody's Talking About Jamie is available to watch now on Amazon Prime Video.
Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.
