Review: AMERICAN IDIOT Tri-oomphs in Tempe

Each generation responds in its own distinctive way to the excesses and profligacies of its society. Each has its prophets and bards who wax in protest, poetry, and song about culture's errant ways.

In 2004, in the aftermath of the World Trade Center bombings and in the wake of America's invasion of Iraq, there was enough turmoil, controversy, and rage to fuel a new outburst of dissension. GREEN DAY's AMERICAN IDIOT entered the fray, and Billie Joe Armstrong's canon of lyrics, documenting the quest of Jesus of Suburbia for meaning, resonated with fans who were fed up with political deception and the commercialization of everything. The album went platinum, won the 2005 Grammy for Best Rock Album, and served as the platform for a punk rock opera that garnered a nomination for best musical and two wins in other categories at the 2010 Tony's.

Fast forward to 2016. Ron May, Stray Cat Theatre's founding artistic director and the Valley of the Sun's enfant terrible, further has further propelled his arc of artistic excellence with a stunning staging of AMERICAN IDIOT, and, in turn, reveals the work's continued relevance.

The production is a triumph in every sense of the word. May can lay claim to a trifecta of oomphs, oomphatically!

Oomph! The walls of Tempe's Center for the Arts are likely reverberating still ~ and will ~ from the virtual explosion of high voltage rock, a 95-minute marathon performance by the five piece band directed by Andy Kust.

Oomph! The choreography of Scorpius Dance Theatre's Lisa Starry is compelling, vital, and muscular. She marches the ensemble through a paradoxical mix of zombie-like walks and vigorous fist pumping that suggests the inner struggle between alienation and action.

Oomph! The ensemble of fifteen is terrific, a dynamic display of the treasure of talent in the Phoenix area. The performances are electrifying. At the center of the action is Johnny (Nicholas John Gearing), nee Jesus of Suburbia, who exhorts his restless and disaffected buddies, Tunny (David Samson) and Will (Eric Boudreau), to blow the pop stand of Jingletown. Only Johnny and Tunny hit the road, following the lure of sex, drugs, and rock n' roll, while Will stays behind with his pregnant girl friend, Heather (Megan Moylan). As Tunny's path leads to enlistment, Iraq, and disability, Johnny walks the boulevard of broken dreams, torn between the field forces of an alluring girl Whatsername (Breona Conrad) and a nefarious alter ego, St. Jimmy (a charismatic Alan Khoutakoun).

At the end of the Green Day day, when all is sung and done and the restless youth come home from their odyssey, a simple truth is revealed, poignantly embedded in one of Armstrong's most enigmatic lines from Good Riddance: "Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road/Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go/So make the best of this test and don't ask why/It's not a question but a lesson learned in time/It's something unpredictable but in the end is right/I hope you had the time of your life."

It is a message reminiscent of T.S. Eliot's epiphany in Little Gidding: "We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time." Or of John Kabat-Zinn's revelation that "Wherever you go, there you are."

"I hope you had the time of your life." Maybe Johnny, Tunny, and Will did; maybe not; and maybe they won't know for a long time. The unanswered question is whether, after the drift away from home and the return, there is an alternative to alienation, an imperative to do something other than bay at the moon. It is a question and a challenge that has confronted every generation.

AMERICAN IDIOT may also be an anthem about the nihilism, narcissism, and self-indulgence of a specific cohort of alienated and despondent youth. It may be a mirror through which Armstrong and Green Day reflect on the facts of the time as they are and move the audience to further reflection. It is certainly a call to reject the idiocy that has become the currency of the media and politics ~ to reject the new mania, the sound of hysteria, the programmed paranoia, the subliminal advertising of false promises, the redneck agenda. The cultural toxicity to which the music refers is vividly revealed in the backdrop of streaming vidclips displaying the crude antics of reality TV, the commercialization of the body and beauty, the bloviating of politicians, and the malicious dumbing down of America.

However one ultimately Ron May's staging of GREEN DAY's AMERICAN IDIOT is a cause for celebration. It is an affirmation of the power of the theatre not only to entertain but also to provoke contemplation.

For certain, the show is a blast and a resounding success.

AMERICAN IDIOT continues its run at the Tempe Center for the Arts through July 16th.

Photo credit to John Groseclose

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