SITE GUIDE
SEARCH
REVIEWS
REVIEW ARCHIVES
ADVERTISING AT CURTAINUP
FEATURES
NEWS
Etcetera and
Short Term Listings
LISTINGS
Broadway
Off-Broadway
NYC Restaurants
BOOKS and CDs
OTHER PLACES
Berkshires
London
California
New Jersey
Philadelphia
Elsewhere
QUOTES
TKTS
PLAYWRIGHTS' ALBUMS
LETTERS TO EDITOR
FILM
LINKS
MISCELLANEOUS
Free Updates
Masthead
A CurtainUp Los Angeles Review
Hands on a Hardbody
By Jon Magaril
|
So anyone with the nerve — the tenacity — can drive away with the American dream.—
Frank Nugent
|
Jay Armstrong Johnson, Allison Case, and Hunter Foster
(photo by Kevin Berne) |
Tony Award winner Once, for instance, grounds its numbers in the reality of Irish pub-crawling troubadours. However, nothing beats gospel, that mainstay of weekly church services, as the presiding style for believable showstoppers. Its inclusion here is so expected that when “Joy of the Lord” starts near the end of the first act, it feels anticlimactic. Then the writing and staging shift ingeniously into higher and higher gear until the performance reaches full throttle.
The source material is a '97 film documentary depicting a Texas competition in which a Nissan pickup truck is given to the contestant who keeps his or her hand on the vehicle the longest. The musical sets itself on a challenging artistic road. It wants to honor the small town reality of its subject matter — the hardscrabble lives of people for whom a truck would make a world of difference — while crafting a crowd-pleasing musical on a fairly large scale. Like its characters, the show achieves its ambitions when tethered most directly to reality.
“Joy of the Lord” begins as if Settle's Norma has been listening to the number through her headphones. She sings unaccompanied until the others join in, still a capella. The beat is so infectious they pound on the car, transforming it like a prop from Stomp into a percussion instrument. Moving in unison, they start spinning the car. Choreographer Benjamin Millepied (best known for his work in ballet and the film Black Swan) makes the most of his only opportunity to let loose.
At the top of the second act, the unabashedly entertaining title number is delivered as an amateur rockabilly act by the radio DJ Frank Nugent (Scott Wakefield) and Mike, the Nissan dealership's manager (Jim Newman, doing well in a tricky role) to rouse the contest audience, and us, from the doldrums of a long night.
When the creative team can find no overtly realistic pretext for a number they seem to lose their theatrical nerve. Its as if their admirable desire to avoid the showbizzy sins of condescension, flash, or clich?neuters their ambition.
Composer Trey Anastasio (leader of the seminal rock band Phish), and lyricist/composer Amanda Green (scion of Broadway legends Adolph Green and Phyllis Newman) set out to write a score the characters would listen to. As conceived, most are tuning in to the same radio station. They express themselves predominantly in a folk-country style that's tangy and pleasing. The score would achieve greater distinction if Anastasio and Green found just a few more opportunities to test the musical limits of the characters and themselves.
Book writer Doug Wright, whose Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning I Am My Own Wife was also developed by the La Jolla Playhouse, has whittled the documentary's two dozen contestants down to ten. A fellow Texan, he's drawn them with dialogue that plays true to the locale. He magnanimously doesn't play favorites — letting us choose whom to root for - so treats ten characters with equal focus.
Wright also supplies several subplots that need frequent attention. Mike promises his girlfriend-on-the-side (Kathleen Elizabeth Monteleone) he'll help her win the contest. Even the cheaters get Wright's admirable empathy. Mike needs the competition to bring in paying customers or the dealership will close. The downside to Wright's laundry list of demanding tasks is he doesn't give the characters much room to develop beyond type. For instance, Wright draws Mike as essentially weak and not all that bright, which deprives the show of a compelling antagonist.
The contest, in and of itself or as a metaphor for the plight of the 99%, is rarely questioned by the creators or competitors. Instead the countervailing force is a more general sense of economic distress. Unacknowledged in most musicals, its centrality to Hands on a Hardbody makes the show welcome, compelling, and potentially necessary.
In the second act, no-nonsense Janie Curtis (a strong Dale Soules) discovers Mike's special treatment of Heather. The fury in her number “It's a Fix” taps into larger currents of fairness that ripple through the theater, but the show doesn't build on it. Her fellow competitors don't turn on the contest's organizers or each other. Their behavior, their hopes, and the show's effect stay largely respectable and constrained. A deflating sense of sameness sets in.
The show could take a few more tips from its musical forebearer A Chorus Line. The performers audition in real time without a break, so the stakes are immediate and heightened. At two acts running over two and a half hours, Hardbody's endurance test spreads past the footlights.
A Chorus Line's structure is cannily devised. Just as dread sets in that each of the characters is going to have their moment one by one down the line, pairs and trios of characters start combining. Then all blend in that fifteen minute ode to adolescence, “Hello Twelve. . ..” so that all bets are off on how things will unfold as they await who'll be chosen.
No slouch, Wright devises some surprises of his own. One of the first songs presents a contestant only to stop abruptly as his farewell. When fetching young Kelli (the appropriately enchanting Allison Case) describes in “I'm Gone” how she'll use the truck to hightail it out of Laredo, Chris (Jay Armstrong Johnson) hitches onto her dream and plans to join her if either wins.
Still, the first act plays mostly as a series of introductions. The second act develops into a series of ballad-driven goodbyes without ratcheting up significant suspense. The lessons learned by the last remaining competitors followed by the finale's summation, “Keep Your Hands on It” seem more pro forma than fully earned.
Hardbody doesn't need an overhaul. The dexterous ensemble covering a wide range of ages and ethnicities is a keeper. Keith Carradine leads with taciturn charm as loner JD who has health problems and even bigger trouble opening up to his wife Virginia (a redoubtable Mary Gordon Murray). I admit to rooting most for Jon Rua's earnest Jesus Pena. His “Born in Laredo” is equal parts resolute and wrenching.
The direction by Neil Pepe, who specializes in gritty contemporary plays, is clean and effective. His thrilling staging of one character's descent into delirium exemplifies the mix of theatricality and emotional truth the production aims for and occasionally achieves. The design by the unbeatable Christine Jones (set and tricked-out truck), Kevin Adams (lighting), and Susan Hilferty (costumes) is spare and spot-on.
Hands on a Hardbody has a rare chance to serve as both a thrill ride and a vehicle for change. A thorough tune-up in preparation for the move to Broadway would help the production click on all cylinders. The writers just need to put the theatrical pedal to the metal.
|
Hands on a Hardbody Book by Doug Wright Lyrics by Amanda Green, Music by Trey Anastasio Musical staging by Benjamin Millepied Directed by Neil Pepe Cast: Keith Carradine (JD Drew), Allison Case (Kelli Mangrum), Hunter Foster (Benny Perkins), Jay Armstrong Johnson (Greg Wilhote), David Larsen (Chris Alvaro), Jacob Ming Trent ( Ronald McGowan), Kathleen Elizabeth Monteleone (Heather Stovall ), Mary Gordon Murray (Virginia Drew), Jim Newman (Mike Ferris), Connie Ray (Cindy Barnes), Keala Settle (Norma Valverde), Dale Soules (Janis Curtis), Scott Wakefield (Frank Nugent), William Youmans (Don Curtis/ Dr Stokes) Music Direction: Zachary Dietz Scenic Design: Christine Jones Costume Design: Susan Hilferty Lighting Design: Kevin Adams Sound Design: Steve Canyon Kennedy Running Time: Two hours, twenty minutes plus intermission Mandell Weiss Theatre, La Jolla Playhouse 2910 La Jolla Village Drive La Jolla, California 92037 (858) 550-1010 From April 27 – June 17, 2012 Reviewed by Jon Magaril based on May 28, 2012 matinee performance Song List It's a Human Drama Thing Alone with Me Master Benny's Winning Strategies A Little Somethin' Somethin' If I Had a Truck My Problem Right There Burn That Bridge I'm Gone Joy of the Lord Stronger Hunt with the Big Dogs Hands on a Hardbody Born in Laredo It's a Fix Used to Be God Answered My Prayers The Tryers Joy of the Lord (Reprise) Keep Your Hands on It |
|
REVIEW FEEDBACK Highlight one of the responses below and click "copy" or"CTRL+C"
Paste the highlighted text into the subject line (CTRL+ V): Feel free to add detailed comments in the body of the email. . .also the names and emails of any friends to whom you'd like us to forward a copy of this review. Visit Curtainup's Blog Annex For a feed to reviews and features as they are posted add http://curtainupnewlinks.blogspot.com to your reader Curtainup at Facebook . . . Curtainup at Twitter Subscribe to our FREE email updates: E-mail: esommer@curtainup.comesommer@curtainup.com put SUBSCRIBE CURTAINUP EMAIL UPDATE in the subject line and your full name and email address in the body of the message. If you can spare a minute, tell us how you came to CurtainUp and from what part of the country. |
Anything Goes Cast Recording
Book of Mormon -CD