UNDER FIRE
By Robert Sherrill
Here I sit in my first production meeting with composer Grant Sturiale, along with writer/director Barry Harman, Producer John Bonanni, and designer Merope Vachlioti. John pushes play on the Ipod and guitar music fills the room; I think of the Buena Vista Social Club or the Gypsy Kings, yet it is the opening guitar chords of Grant's new song, ADELANTE, the first song in the new musical UNDER FIRE, that fill the room.
As the music swirls around us, Merope pulls a model of the set out of a bag with the word "delight!" imprinted on its side. Along with the model are small pieces, in scale, of the ammo boxes that will be configured differently throughout the show to form the many locales called for in the script. The scenes move from an elephant herd in Africa to the jungles, discos, government offices, and rebel headquarters of Central America, all the while accompanied by Grant's guitar chords, sometimes frenetic, other times soothing and romantic. Barry, who enjoyed Broadway success and 2 Tony nominations for ROMANCE, ROMANCE, explains that he wanted to tackle this story in order to write about people facing crisis points in their lives, where issues such as honor and responsibility are skewed by love and country.
We move the models of the actors through the scenes, almost enacting the musical, dancing them on and off in a twirl of color and a whirlwind of motion and emotion, everyone contributing ideas and suggestions of ways to fully realize Barry and Grant's show.
And as I listen and follow the story, I am aware that it looks at a wartime world, seen through the eyes of foreign correspondents. It is a world filled with triangles: two men, Price and Alec, and Claire, the woman they both love, the Central American government, the rebels and outside interests, the three women who power the story in Claire, Isela, and Miss Panama, and the cities, the jungles, and the countryside. Yet, in the end, each person faces the same crises: who to love, how to love, and why!
Find out more at the Theatre at St. Clement's starting September 30th!
