Amadeus review: classical music is Bach and better than ever in Sky's reinvention of scathing rivalry
A few days before I started watching Amadeus, an influx of young people flooded my TikTok For You Page, playing various Bach pieces on different orchestral instruments while remixing each song with modern music. It was all thanks to a passing trend, but it did briefly make me wonder if classical musical was making a resurgence in digital pop culture.
If those same kids watch the new five-episode Sky TV series, I think they'd be astounded. Amadeus goes far beyond a musical education for the uninitiated, delving further into the alleged rivalry between composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri than ever before.
Summing this rivalry up in one word would be easy: unhinged. The pair moves far beyond the stereotypical boundaries of 'frenemies,' leaving their desperate acts of reconciliation until it's too late. I would never have paired Will Sharpe (Mozart) and Paul Bettany (Salieri) up to portray this, but together, their chemistry is undeniable.
What's more difficult to explain is the complexities behind this rivalry. I rather badly relayed it back to the cast as the 1700s version of Peggy Mitchell and Pat Butcher, from UK soap opera Eastenders. Theirs was a connection that spanned decades, ranging from heartfelt consolation to vindictive plotting and literal fist fights. You never know where you stand with them, and that's a thing of beauty.
It's not the best example I've ever come up with, but ideologically, I'm right on the money. The constant volatile tension hanging in the air means you never fully catch your breath – but while Amadeus is narratively sound, it's visually questionable.
Sky has saved its best show of 2025 until last with Amadeus
If you look at the YouTube comments on the above video, fans of the original play (by Peter Shaffer) and the subsequent movie (directed by Miloš Forman) aren't pleased that the same tale is about to be retold. Honestly, I don't blame them. We can hardly move for TV and film adaptations that add no cultural value of their own, but I don't think Amadeus can be tarnished with the same brush.
Even if both our previous versions were flawless (the three-hour long film is far from structurally sound, in my opinion), another adaptation would need to add a fresh perspective. Luckily for us, that's exactly what Amadeus does.
Without giving too much away, the TV series includes Shaffer's own journey to writing his play, with the final scene of episode 5 breaking the fourth wall in a way I'm not sure I've ever seen attempted in television. Sky's creative risk-taking has flown under the radar, and the rest of the series is just as ambitious.
Sharpe captures Mozart's alleged fiery temperament like it's the easiest thing in the word, and it's the foundation for the rest of the story's chaos. No one episode can contain the multitudes of emotions bursting at its seams, with either Mozart of Salieri (or sometimes both) crumbling, celebrating, or threatening to jump out of a window (that's our unintentionally hilarious opening, so keep your eye out).
Amadeus throws everything and the kitchen sink at its storytelling, and the charged environment is almost a character in itself. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that it's the main reason why you need to watch it.
Some of our cast have 'iPhone face', and that's a problem
None of this is to say that our leading trio aren't exceptional in their own right. Kudos for our destructive duo is well-deserved, with both Sharpe and Bettany giving the performance of their careers. I do wonder whether Bettany is going extra hard to distance himself from upcoming Marvel series VisionQuest, but perhaps that's just me being a franchise cynic.
While Gabrielle Creevy (Constanze Mozart) hits the right note as the long-suffering go-between for the musical rivals, there's something about the cast that bothers me. To me, all younger members (and by that, I mean under the age of about 40) look as though that have 'iPhone face'. What I mean by this is that just by looking at them, you can tell that they've seen an iPhone in their lifetime.
The makeup and costumes in Amadeus are beautiful, but they don't hide the fact that just by existing, some of the cast are too modern. Even so, Sharpe particularly surprised me with just how stupendous his raucous, obscene and ridiculously arrogant take on Mozart is... I just have to put to one side that he clearly knows how WiFi works.
The five-episode run does suffer from the classic issue of narrative lag between episodes 3 and 4, but when everything else has such a frenetic energy to it, this isn't hard to overlook. This of course includes the music, which Sharped learned to play (rather than just flailing his hands about while the camera is shrewdly positioned to hide the truth).
As captivating as the scandal, drama and intricacies of Viennese society in the 18th century are, it all comes back to the music. It helps us to understand the world, Mozart and Salieri's struggles and ourselves in the process, and it's pushed me to make some conscious additions to my usual Spotify playlists.
Their work is that both tortured composers ultimately wanted to be remembered for, and thanks to Amadeus' blend of just about everything in their lives, music still comes out on top.
Stream Amadeus from December 21 in the UK using the below deals:
Sky 'Essential TV' package: from £15 per month at Sky
This is the cheapest Sky TV package available. It includes a Sky Stream device as well as access to 'Sky Atlantic', which airs Sky and HBO Originals through the Sky Stream streaming service, Netflix (its 'Standard with ads' tier), Discovery+ and over 100 free to air channels, such as BBC, ITV and Channel 4. This price is for a 24 month rolling contract but you can get it for £18 on a 31 day rolling contract too. Just note that the price will convert to £21 a month after the 24 months. View Deal
Sky 'Ultimate TV' package: from £22 per month at Sky
While it's a bit more expensive, you definitely get a lot more content for the extra £7 compared to the 'Essential TV' package. On top of 'Sky Atlantic', Netflix and Discovery+, Sky Stream and 90 free to air channels, this deal throws in 35 extra channels, such as 'Sky Comedy', 'Sky Crime', National Geographic and MTV. This monthly fee is for a 24 month rolling contract that will go up to £35 a month after the period, but you can also get it for £25 on a 31 day rolling contract. View Deal
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