In my life I have dreamed a thousand dreams of you.
In my life, somehow I believe somehow I knew
In my life, you would walk into it unexpectedly
In my life, I knew you were meant for me.
I've never booed in a theatre. I doubt if I ever will. But thanks to Mr. Joseph Brooks, the composer/lyricist/bookwriter/director/producer of In My Life, I felt the urge to boo more strongly than any other time in my life.
The moment of complete disgust with what I was witnessing came late in the show, when two characters performed a vaudevillian song-and-dance, using rudimentary steps at best, singing a soft drink jingle that Brooks had written for a commercial years ago. Earlier in the evening one of the characters sang another one of Brooks' old jingles, this one about a car. During a scene where a better writer and director may have tried developing his characters a little, Brooks had his leading lady pull a can of soda out of her fridge and practically display the brand name to the audience like a trade show spokes-model before popping open the top and pouring it into a glass so we might better hear the crisp bubbles sparkling their fizzy sound through her body mic. And of course, nothing goes better with a can of soda than a snack of dry cereal eaten straight from the box; just be careful to make sure the product's name is clearly facing the audience. Ya know, I thought I was attending a Broadway musical, not some corporate industrial show.
Oh, trust me, I never would have actually booed. That would have been unfair to the innocent actors who were simply doing their jobs as best they could. Perhaps Mr. Brooks would consider coming to the show once a week to take a bow so audience members can boo him directly. It could be the cleansing moment needed after giving the cast a well-deserved round of applause for the astounding feat of performing this material without breaking into tears and cursing the day their agents sent them to audition for this vulgar mess that wears its heart on its generic easy-listening wallet.
It almost feels like love
On the wings of a pure white dove.
Why don't the stars above
Shine down with one true love?
See, In My Life isn't simply a bad musical. Go to the theatre often enough and you'll see your share of bad musicals. It's sad when it happens, but it's really no big deal. What angers and offends me so much about this show is that in 2005 we can have a book musical come to Broadway that shows a complete disregard for the basic concept of using songs as a part of the story. The characters in this show rarely sing to each other during their scenes, and when they do they generally don't say much more than what can be easily be taken out of the show and enjoyed on morning radio without distracting you too much from the traffic ahead.
By littering the Music Box Theatre with a collection of sound-alike pop ballads that make universal references to the roads of life we travel, the stars in the heavens and the strange life we live, Brooks has, in a sense, created a jukebox musical using new songs. I would not be surprised if in the next several years the stages of showplaces like Branson, Missouri saw a parade of vocalists announcing to audiences, "And now I'd like to sing a lovely ballad from the Broadway musical In My Life, which was unfairly torn apart by those elitist New York critics who think musicals should contain good writing." (Maybe they'd leave out that last part.)
It's raining flowers from the sky,
Don't let the moment pass you by,
Take a chance while there is still time
Because life turns on a dime.
The above lyric is from the song that opens the show. According to the plot, it's written by J.T. (Christopher J. Hanke), an apparently untalented songwriter with Tourette's Syndrome. His occasional blurts of "Fuck! Suck! Duck!" are the least predictable rhymes that leave his mouth. While innocently sitting in a diner trying to eat a sandwich, he is confronted by Jenny (Jessica Boevers), who apparently has no taste in music because J.T.'s insipid sentiments which would make a Hallmark poet snicker have touched her so deeply that within a minute she's babbling about Jung, synchronicity and calling him her soulmate. Now, I've never written a book musical, but something inside me seems to think there are plot points in there which should be expressed through song. But no, the scene ends unmusically with Jenny taking him to her apartment where they have a quick round of sex (no song yet) and then talk about how they have to put their clothes back on even though they're both sitting on the floor fully dressed. J.T. concludes that Jenny has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, a point she denies. Ah, conflict! Conflict involving a guy with Tourette's and a women who may have O.C.D. A perfect moment for a... Well, maybe not.
See, the general song placement method of In My Life is to have scenes occur in their entirety, then have a character left alone to sing a solo ballad summarizing his or her feelings about what just happened in terms so unspecific that radio listeners can easily relate the songs to moments in their own lives. I believe this is how hit songs and bad musicals are made.
You cannot tell by looking at me
But I'm my mother's son.
I walk a different path sometimes but
I am my mother's son.
She taught me everything I know
And what I have become
Is a product of her soul.
I am my mother's son.
Jenny has a friend named Samantha (Laura Jordon) who has wild red/orange hair and says things like, "I need this relationship like I need sand up my butt.", so you know she's a hip, edgy New Yorker. Her boyfriend Nick (Michael Halling) died in a car accident while he was driving drunk and in doing so took the lives of who we immediately figure out are J.T.'s mom (Roberta Gumbal) and little sister. (12-year-old Chiara Navarra, who has loud pipes and has technically mastered the art of riffing, but needs to grow before she can put some real emotion behind it.) Although Navarra's character is a substantially sized role, this coincidental subplot moves nowhere and never effects the main plot in any way whatsoever.
Which brings us to Winston (David Turner, who must have done something really awful in a previous life to have to do this eight times a week), the flaming queen angel who is Heaven's leading opera director. (This is a show where gay stereotypes and jokes about fairies, fruits and limp wrists provide a refreshing relief from the plot.) Winston seems to think that opera has something to do with pirates acting like The Three Stooges, but that's okay because God (Michael J. Farina) seems to think opera has something to do with singing commercial jingles by Joseph Brooks. God is on vacation (I believe that's meant to be whimsical) and has assigned Winston to put on a reality opera -- I'll write that again... a reality opera -- for his amusement, and J.T. and Jenny seem like perfect subjects. It's never really clear as to whether the couple's lives are being controlled by Winston or if he's just observing, but clarity is not one of Brooks' major priorities. Whenever something inexplicable happens, it's shrugged off with a line like, "That's not important now" or "Things have gotten complicated."
Secrets...
There's a little rumor
Someone's got a tumor
So just when he's found a woman who's willing to put up with his senseless blurts like "rain and sane are imperfect rhymes" (they're not) and "Jenny is a bad name for rhyming" (Ira Gershwin did a pretty good job with it) it seems J.T. has a brain tumor. Much hilarity is attempted as Winston imagines what a fun scene this would make for his opera so he dances around the stage with a skeleton. Oh yes, apparently they can sing stuff other than easy listening ballads in Heaven. I guess that's what makes it Heaven.
While Brooks' direction rarely makes sense of his writing (one song begins with J.T. strumming on his guitar and after he puts it down the sound of guitar strumming continues) he's got a fine design team that at least makes things look interesting. Allen Moyer's set is well detailed, but pretty much gets overshadowed by Wendall K. Harrington's projections which places scenes in specific Manhattan locales, makes Heaven an enormous filing cabinet, and provides distracting visuals during songs that are too embarrassing to watch. As the audience waits for the show to begin they see an enormous projection of clouds and the occassional bird floating through the sky. I'm convinced there are subliminal messages in there somewhere telling us to buy a souvenir t-shirt. Catherine Zuber's costumes border on the odd sometimes, but in this show I supposed that's required. The cast, God bless 'em, play their roles with such sincerity like they were doing Carousel, Guys and Dolls and My Fair Lady combined.
There are some terrific musicals out there. Right here in New York there are shows in workshops, small venues, readings and festivals that prove the American musical is still a thrilling art form that can speak to today's audience with intelligence, taste and theatricality, whether they be heavy dramas or fluffy fun. Which is why it's so frustrating to see an ineptly written vehicle for ineffectual elevator music get the bucks to pollute the theatre that once housed new works by Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, George and Ira Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart and Noel Coward.
Not since Carrie?
More like not since The Black Crook.
Photos by Joan Marcus: (top to bottom)
Jessica Boevers and Christopher J. Hanke
Michael J. Farina and David Turner
Laura Jordan, Christopher J. Hanke and Carmen Keels
Jessica Boevers
