Jonathan Larson never quite saw his 36th birthday, and the Pulitzer Prize he won for Rent in 1996 was awarded posthumously. So it’s tempting to detect premonitions of mortality in Larson’s rock opera, where characters struggle poignantly against AIDS, addiction, loneliness and poverty. But Larson’s preoccupation with mortality — and the hardships of la vie Boheme — comes across in a sunnier light in tick, tick… BOOM!, currently at Actor’s Theatre. This pocket musical was originally inspired by the self-empowering monologues of Eric Bogosian and Spalding Gray. Not only did Larson live to see this work on its feet, he performed it himself.
Ironically, BOOM! chronicles the disheartening dead-end of yet another Larson opus that the composer never saw in a full production, his musical adaptation of Orwell’s 1984 that he was forced to rewrite as Superbia — because the rights were not available. We follow Jon through the last days before his double witching hours, when Superbia gets a staged reading attended by Stephen Sondheim and our protagonist reaches his 30th birthday.
The script is deftly rearranged by David Auburn, a Pulitzer Prize winner in his own right (Proof), so that it frisks about buoyantly for three actors instead of one. With Jon’s girlfriend Susan onstage yearning for a respite from the New York rat race and a fresh start in Connecticut, we see the dilemma of Jon’s personal life more clearly. Jon’s best friend Michael peeps in just as frequently, showing off his BMW and his posh apartment. A former actor, Michael says there’s an open spot at his marketing firm screaming out for Jon’s creativity.
So Jon’s professional dilemma is even more sharply dramatized.
With Tommy Foster as Jon, the ferocious intensity of the composer’s ambition occasionally verges on self-absorbed rock & roll egotism, but the quixotic quality of his perseverance eventually becomes rather endearing. Toward the end of Act 1, in duets with Michael and Susan, the wittiness of Sondheim insinuates itself into the evening, conclusively dispelling all fears that we’ll be wallowing in sentiment or self-pity.
As our hero luxuriates in Michael’s apartment, “No More” joyously transmits Jon’s wholesome susceptibility to American materialism. The vertigo of his “Therapy” dialogue with Susan is the hippest lyric in the show — and the most obvious homage to Sondheim.
With musical direction from Marty Gregory, the score sounds more intimate and acoustic than it does on the cast album snippets I’ve sampled. That’s all to the good. So is Chip Decker’s angular, glittery set design with its knowing Manhattan accents.
Stage director Craig Spradley has his cast delivering more nuanced readings of Larson’s lyrics than you’ll hear on the CD, and he makes resourceful use of Decker’s set design. Production values are easily on a par with any musical that Actor’s Theatre has produced before.
Toss in the electricity of all the new faces onstage and I found myself comparing this effort on Stonewall Street with shows I’ve seen off-Broadway on Bleecker Street, Lafayette Street and 42nd Street. While it’s probably fair to place Joseph Klosek as Michael and Katie Flaherty as Susan in the category of supporting actors, they do so many additional roles so well that they shine like co-stars.
Flaherty was primarily notable for her galvanic vocals, yet she proved nearly as chameleonic as Klosek in his multiple cameo gems. Yes, Jon has the strength to resist both the sexual pull of suburban domesticity and the perks of the corporate world. Thanks to the bravura of Flaherty and Klosek, Foster’s triumph feels like it’s worth celebrating.
Susan Roberts Knowlson, the local diva you may have expected to see in BOOM!, is currently two blocks south at Children’s Theatre : and absolutely scintillating in the title role of Miss Nelson Is Missing! Saddled with the fourth-grade terrors of Room 207, all of whom need to quit their Ritalin cold turkey, Miss Nelson goes into a strategic retreat, replaced by the horrific Miss Viola Swamp during her hibernation.The ruler-wielding substitute teacher from hell is an absolute hoot in Joan Cushin’s musical adaptation of Harry Allard’s cautionary children’s yarn. Curing cancer by tomorrow morning is just part of the humongous homework Swamp heaps on her class. Knowlson’s transformation is abetted by the costume designing exploits of Bob Croghan, keeping the bad hair and the garish socks intact from James Marshall’s delightful illustrations.
But the epitome of Croghan’s mischief comes in the peach-colored seersucker pattern that he applies to Detective McSmogg’s ridiculously Sherlockian outerwear. Mark Sutton makes a meal of this deaf, doddering role, personifying the sleuth Miss Nelson’s desperate students would least like to see on the trail of their missing teacher. Sutton’s rendition of the British-flavored “McSmogg Is Here” registers as high on the laugh meter as Knowlson’s portentous “Woe to Those Who Misbehave.” Like Knowlson, Sutton morphs into different guises, most comically as the supremely nerdy Principal Blandsworth, afflicted with terrible delusions of being interesting.
Ron Chisholm’s dopey choreography adds a delightful giddiness to the comedy. Eric Winkenwerder’s lighting takes on a fiendish hue each time Swamp approaches the school, somehow curling the curtains of Croghan’s fanciful set. Jill Bloede is obviously having a ball directing this merry prank. Two performances have been added to the sold-out run next Sunday at 2 and 4pm. That probably won’t satisfy the public’s craving for this 53 minutes of highly addictive silliness.
Off-Tryon Theatre is wasting no time in hitting their stride in their new home at the SouthEnd Performing Arts Center. The company’s first production of 2005, Anna Karenina, offers two powerful performances from Kristen Jones and Jeremy Cartee in the leading roles.What will probably surprise travelers to SPAC is who these players are. Yes, of course, Jones is Anna, the free-thinking modern woman who is ultimately consumed by the backwardness of Russian society and the vindictiveness of her husband. But Cartee is neither her husband Alexie Karenin nor her gallant lover Count Vronsky. In Helen Edmundson’s ambitious stage adaptation, he is Kostya Levin, the proud and principled landowner whose yearnings for his Kitty go unsatisfied for so long.
Kostya’s chunk of Tolstoy’s epic novel is customarily excised from stage and screen, but the Edmundson adaptation, smartly atomized to obviate the need for scenery, makes a strong case for restoring Levin to the overall tapestry. Off-Tryon artistic director Glenn Griffin keeps tedium away for nearly all of the two hours and 17 minutes of playing time, largely thanks to the unflagging intensity of Jones and Cartee.
If somewhat young for a self-confident politician, Dymetro Krepak has the steeliness of Karenin nicely gauged, and John Horton has a palpable dreamboat factor going for him as Vronsky. In her Charlotte debut, Sharon Pinney makes Kitty lovable — even if she is vacant, sickly and vain.
This article appears in Apr 13-19, 2005.
