New York Theater, Fall ’23

In Dig, by Theresa Rebeck at 59E59 Theaters, every line of dialogue is a speech, illuminating the speaker or advancing the plot. The actions are often loaded metaphors too: Roger’s repotting a damaged plant in the opening scene, giving it food, attention and room to grow, previews the main course of the play, a repotting of the damaged Megan. A lot is thrown at the viewer over several days in the plant shop, and we don’t always know if the business is failing or coming back. There are possibly more plot twists than the play’s single set can contain; but for the most part the play’s careful construction holds things together. Both leads had multifaceted personalities, to say the least, but were ultimately sympathetic, which left us with a good feeling.

By contrast, the lines in Annie Baker’s Infinite Life could have been taken from real life. There wasn’t much plot to advance, nor were characters hot one moment, cold the next. Lines, in fact, were short and few, but many brought a chuckle or a smile of recognition. With great economy, we felt we knew the characters, and each was a more believable, relatable person than anyone in Dig. If there was a moral or message, I missed it. But none was really needed. Yes, there were thoughts on pain, and even sharper ones on sex; but I mainly found myself entranced by Christina Kirk as Sofi as she spent her week at the spa.

Without any intent, a large majority of our theater-going this fall took us to musicals, of very different stripe. The most traditional by far was a revival of Stephen Sondheim’s  Merrily We Roll Along, which has been better received than it was in 1981. The production is superb, and the leading performances of Jonathan Groff and Daniel Radcliffe are excellent; I wasn’t wild about the third, Lindsay Mendez, but that could be due to the role as written. The story is the opposite of uplifting, as it stars a talented songwriter who sells his art for commerce, his wife for glitz, and soul, apparently, to the Hollywood devil. The score, I’m told, is among Sondheim’s best, which for my ear meant the songs were pleasant but not memorable. Ultimately, the whole thing felt dated, like an exquisitely produced Broadway musical of 1981.

In another musical that we enjoyed the action took place in 1976-77, but the feeling was very “now.” Stereophonic recounted the making of a follow-up album by a mixed rock group (three men, two women; three Yanks, two Brits) with two recording engineers as the Greek chorus. We were back in the world of Almost Famous or Spinal Tap, a world I loved in absentia: sex, drugs and rock’n’roll. The songs weren’t part of the plot; they were being recorded for release by this band and, written by Will Butler of Arcade Fire, they were all very good. The actors, amazingly, were as convincing in their music-making as their acting. Each performer got to fully develop their character, including the uncool engineer who ultimately held it all together.

I know Gutenberg! The Musical was a musical because it said so in the title. It wasn’t like it had songs listed in the program, though. I’m too young for Vaudeville, but this is my idea of what Vaudeville was like: two hams making funny faces, corny jokes and surprisingly deft moves around the stage. Josh Gad’s performance was worth the price of admission, and the play’s premise–Gutenberg transposed his wine press to a printing press, thereby creating people’s ability to read–was clever enough. For one act, at least. You got the jokes, and they were funny; but when intermission came it wasn’t clear why they needed a second act. To sell expensive tickets, I guess.

Here Lies Love, conversely, felt like all music all the time, with dancers running through the balcony aisles, the DJ getting us on our feet, and a general disco vibe running from start to finish (and there was a dance party after that). The real life story of Imelda and Ferdinand Marcos and Ninoy Aquino gave the show historical heft and even offered political parallels to our world today, but it was the creative vision of David Byrne that made this show stand out from anything we’ve seen before. The performers were all great, led by Arielle Jacobs as Imelda.

Poor Yella Rednecks was the weakest of the bunch, the stage equivalent of a comic novel. Maureen Sebastian (Tong) was superb, singing, acting and moving, but the other actors came across as cartoon characters, except for Little Man, who was a puppet.

A Beautiful Noise offered a counterpoint to Merrily: in both a talented songwriter gets a boost from someone in the business, becomes fabulously successful, is carried away by the glamor and glitz, losing wives and children, and ends up in a bad place. Being an authorized biography of Neil Diamond, however, he finds himself at the end: “I Am, I Said.” I’m not a Diamond fan (my 2,500-song playlist contains nothing by him), but the music worked, thanks to exhilarating dance numbers by a marvelously diverse chorus, a little help from the wives, and a cleverly caricaturish Diamond impression by Will Swenson.