KT Tunstall on Clueless the Musical and debut album turning 20: ‘It could easily have not worked’

KT Tunstall knows that things don’t always work out as planned, but sometimes, that’s for the best.

The singer-songwriter was showered with awards after bursting into the spotlight in the mid-noughties with indie-pop hits including “Suddenly I See” and “Black Horse and the Cherry Tree” – four BRIT Award nominations, including a win, a Grammy nod and two Ivor Novellos, to be specific – but she’s aware it quite as easily couldn’t have happened.

“I think one of the things that was just such a blessing for that first record is that I couldn’t get a record deal. There was just no interest,” she tells PinkNews of making her five-time platinum debut solo album Eye to the Telescope, which has just turned 20. Eventually, the album had to be made in a makeshift studio on a shoestring budget with a minor label.

“We were in the middle of the countryside in Bradford-upon-Avon in Somerset in some dude’s house that he’d turned into a studio where he was living with his mum, and we’re like duct-taping duvets on the wall to get the right sound,” she recalls with a soft Scottish lilt. There was no money for big bands or transatlantic production teams. It was Tunstall on piano, and producer Steve Osborne on bass. “I think in the end, that’s what was so magic about it, was that it made it totally timeless because it’s just very honest.”

Tunstall’s latest project feels, in a roundabout way, apt. For the past four years, she’s been on the music team of the new, West End musical adaptation of Amy Heckerling’s nineties cult classic teen comedy, Clueless, putting the original score together (Heckerling has returned, putting a book together for the musical’s story). 

On video call, Tunstall is holed up in an office above a rehearsal room, the cast beavering away beneath her. Kinky Boots actress Emma Flynn is taking on the lead role as polished and popular high school matchmaker Cher Horowitz, the role which sent Alicia Silverstone’s career skyward. Cher Horowitz is someone for whom things don’t always go right either, no matter how hard she pulls the puppet strings.

Clueless, The Musical follows the film closely: after Beverly Hills’ social heavyweight Cher finds success in setting up two of her teachers on a date – leading to an upped grade for her – she unlocks a penchant for improving the lives of those around her. She continues with grungy new kid Tai, giving her a well-intentioned but misguided makeover and attempting to orchestrate both of their love lives. But she swiftly discovers that not everyone or everything can be moved like chess pieces on a board, and that she has to learn to relinquish control. 

“We’ve all been in a situation where we thought we knew what was going on and we had no clue in the end and we got it wrong,” Tunstall says about the film’s “actually very sweet” core message. “It’s about making mistakes, forgiving oneself, and then understanding that when you let go of control and accept things, that’s when you can actually start really having deeper relationships rather than fighting against what you don’t want to happen all the time.”

For KT Tunstall, Clueless is one of those films that has always just been there. She was 20 when it came out (the film marks its 30th anniversary this year, while Emma, the Jane Austen book on which it’s loosely based, turns 210), but she “can’t remember never having seen it”. As a British youth, she was fascinated by the film’s portrayal of the American high school foodchain, from the rich elites through to the skater kids, nerds, and arty weirdos.

Plus, as an “indie kid at heart” who’d developed an interest in music as a toddler, the film’s impressive soundtrack, featuring Radiohead, Coolio, Beastie Boys and more, hooked her. “I think that anybody who hasn’t seen the film probably just assumes that it’s kind of bubblegum and pop and it’s absolutely not at all,” she smiles.

Considering the film’s inimitable soundtrack, how did Tunstall feel about giving the musical a whole new score? “We kinda had to move on from the soundtrack,” she explains. It’s all original music, and “a lot of them are bangers”. Influences ranged from Green Day to grunge, NSYNC to House of Pain, Right Said Fred to Sixpence None The Richer. “What I wanted [it] to sound like was the mixtape that’s playing in Cher’s Jeep.”

The music is in fact one of few things that differ greatly between the film and stage version. “We haven’t tried to change the movie,” Tunstall promises. “We’re not trying to give you a different version of the story, in the same way that Amy didn’t try and give a different ending to Emma.” All the classic lines – “I was like, totally buggin’”; “Ugh, as if!”; “May I please remind you that it does not say ‘RSVP’ on the Statue of Liberty,” – are there, plus a few minor plot tweaks and character expansions.

“If it ain’t broke, why fix it? People love this movie. People are very attached to this movie, and so of course we’re going to all celebrate the bits that we love about it,” Tunstall continues.

Queer Clueless fans may wonder how a modern stage adaptation will approach the character of “Cake Boy” Christian, the fashionista student Cher develops a crush on, despite it being widely understood among her peers that he’s gay. Christian isn’t publicly queer, but when Cher finally whacks her gaydar into action, she opts to keep him as a shopping buddy instead.

“We’ve tried to be quite honest, quite true to the film with that,” the musician explains, adding that while “Christian isn’t completely comfortable being out in the school… a lot of the other kids do know and they don’t care”. This Christian, played by Book of Mormon actor Isaac J Lewis, keeps the fedora, black t-shirt and lounge suit, but there’s added pizazz thanks to a retro, swinging dance number in which he’s a main focus.

He’s key to the humour translating from screen to stage, too. “The scene where he has his date over at Cher’s house and she just doesn’t know what’s going on. It’s just funny… I’ll give you one joke that I shouldn’t give you but I have to,” Tunstall teases. “He brings some video cassettes over and he’s brought Spartacus and Top Gun, which is in the song.” She belly laughs. “It’s just fantastic. It’s great. I think what’s really beautiful about it as well is that obviously Cher is pretty crestfallen that her gaydar has been broken in this case and she didn’t realise, but that she makes a really dear friend.”

The opening of Clueless in the West End is mere days away, but it’s just one of few major events happening in Tunstall’s life this year. Marking the 20th anniversary of Eye to the Telescope, plus the 50th anniversary of her existence, she’s throwing herself a “f**king epic” birthday party in the form of a one-off gig at the Royal Albert Hall, on 23 June, her birthday. Tickets sold out rapidly which, considering Tunstall still can’t believe people know the words to her songs, left her dumbfounded. “It’s the holy grail of any musician that you play a song and the audience is singing your song, so it ‘s always ‘pinch me’. It’s always a kind of magic parallel universe where it’s like, ‘Oh my God, I could easily have written these songs and it not have worked’.”

Two decades on, and there have been moments where Tunstall has wanted to take the songs in questions – like “Suddenly I See” with its cultural ubiquity thanks to the likes of The Devil Wears Prada and Ugly Betty – and put them to bed. “I think everybody probably goes through this journey of not wanting to play that stuff anymore, wanting to be seen as a new artist again,” she admits. But then she sees rows upon rows of people singing her lyrics, and the thought dissipates.

“Thankfully, you come around, and you’re just like, ‘Shut your face for heaven’s sake!’ It’s so amazing to me now that I can basically fly almost anywhere in the world, get off a plane, get my guitar, and people know the song,” she says. “I’ll never get tired of that.”

Clueless, The Musical opens at London’s Trafalgar Theatre on 15 February 2025.

Tickets for Eye to the Telescope 20th anniversary shows are available now.

Share your thoughts! Let us know in the comments below, and remember to keep the conversation respectful.