Review - Once: Love Notes

No matter how early you enter the house for New York Theatre Workshop's production of Once, the play is already well underway. Most of the thirteen-member ensemble, all of whom play musical instruments, seem to have long been gathered inside designer Bob Crowley's cozy Dublin pub, playing traditional folk songs, dancing a bit and singing their hearts out. The festive mood resembles the kind of improvised jam session you might luckily stumble upon some night and never want to leave, especially since audience members are welcome to join them on stage, purchase a drink or two and linger a while.

Though patrons are gently scooted back to their seats near showtime, the causal off-the-cuffness continues for a bit but before we realize it's happening, director John Tiffany and lighting designer Natasha Katz have seamlessly brought us into the storytelling aspect of the play without ever letting go of the atmosphere of that friendly neighborhood bar.

I say "play" purposefully. Though Once is being pushed as a musical (Enda Walsh's beautifully written adaptation of John Carney's 2006 screenplay is credited as the book), it's really a play that happens to use a lot of songs as a realistic part of the plot The simple, bittersweet love story has a guitar-playing singer, simply referred to as "Guy" (Steve Kazee) ready to give up on music after a bad break-up, until he meets a somewhat intriguing Czech pianist called "Girl" (Cristin Milioti) who encourages him to not only keep playing, but to take out a loan, get a band together and make a studio demo recording. Though the two grow attracted to each other, each has baggage that would have to be dealt with before a relationship could be considered.

The score by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova (who starred in the film) is an attractive collection of Irish folk/rock selections (including Oscar-winner, "Falling Slowly") that, in context, were written by the characters who sing them and the tricky part of having them presented is that, although some may be inspired by events in the story, they're never specific enough to keep the plot moving. This creates a few slow spots in act one, but Walsh and Tiffany generally do a fine job of making sure every musical moment is about something, even if it's not fully expressed in the lyrics. By the second act, Walsh's outstanding scene work has fully become the emotional guts of the piece, so much so that many of the numbers are completed without applause buttons because the characters' reactions to the songs become more important than the audience's. If you do insist on calling Once a musical, it's a rare musical where the spoken moments are the most memorable; particularly at a point late in the story where a climactic scene is played in its entirety for startling effect with just one sentence.

But when the music does take over, it's given a ravishing treatment. Players not involved with scenes remain on stage with their instruments, joining in at points to give the impression that the pre-show party has never ended. Music supervisor Martin Lowe keeps their collection of mandolins, fiddles, guitars and the like conveying the feel of an impromptu jam. If someone is inspired to dance, choreographer Steven Hoggett's movements are done with the same sense of improvised realism. It comes off so naturally that an isolated moment where the cast moves in unison rings false.

Milioti, who has been doing some excellent work in non-musical Off-Broadway plays, may be giving her breakout performance here; revealing Girl as an emotionally fragile young woman who can be forceful and comically direct with others but painfully timid about herself. She worries about having a cold exterior when she bottles up the love she's fearful of expressing. Kazee gives Guy a sturdy exterior to protect a wounded soul; the kind of man who can only share the many textures of his heart through his music.

Hours (maybe minutes) before Once opened Tuesday night, it was announced that the production has secured a Broadway theatre to move to later this season. Hopefully, the entrancing intimacy of the play can be retained in the larger space.

Photos by Joan Marcus: Top: Steve Kazee and Cristin Milioti; Bottom: Steve Kazee and Company.

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For many Americans - okay, white suburban middle classers into traditional gender roles - the 1950s was an idyllic time when the country could rest easily with our post-war status as the world's super-power before the internal unrest of the 60s began exposing the ugly imperfections. For stressed out, caffeinated 21st Century urbanites, a trip to the world depicted in period sitcoms like Father Knows Best and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet or the nostalgic recreation, Happy Days, might offer a welcome mental vacation to a less-complicated era of structured roles and lower expectations. Or perhaps even a permanent lifestyle change.

That's the clever set-up for Jordan Harrison's very funny comedy of manners Maple and Vine. New Yorker Katha (Marin Ireland) is depressed from her recent miscarriage and burning out from her high-powered publishing career. Her plastic surgeon husband Ryu (Peter Kim) is stressing out over trying to be sympathetic to his wife's needs.

But in between scenes from their marriage, the audience is introduced to what seems like a much happier couple. Dean (Trent Dawson) and Ellen (Jeanine Serralles) are spokespeople for the Society of Dynamic Obsolescence, an organization that runs a gated community where people can voluntarily live the rest of their lives in a re-creation of 1955's middle-American suburbia. As potential residents, Dean and Ellen present us with an orientation outlining what to expect.

"In the '50s you have to go places," Dean explains. "You have to talk to people. You pick up the phone to make a call and there's an operator on the other end and you say "Good morning." Or say you want to find something out, you go down to the library and Miss Wilkes looks it up in the Dewey Decimals. There's a separate store for meat, and fish, and fruit, and a gent behind each counter who knows your name."

"Here are some things you've never heard of," instructs Ellen: "Hummus. Baba Ganoush. Falafel. Focaccia Ciabatta Whole grain bread... What you get is salt."

A chance meeting between Katha and Dean spurs her interest in their six-month trial period and she convinces Ryu that it's worth a shot. Of course, being a mixed-race couple (she's white and he's of Japanese decent), they must relocate to a more tolerant section of the community. Being assigned a role where he spent the war years in a Japanese-American internment camp, Ryu is given an entry-level position in a box factory where he finds satisfaction in performing his simple repetitive task well above the expected pace. Katha grabs a cookbook and dives right into her role as homemaker. It seems that not having choices agrees with them so much that they feel comfortable with the idea of trying again to have a baby, but would it be wrong to raise a child in this environment?

Director Anne Kauffman conveys a tone that mixes dark comedy with tongue-in-cheek wholesome fantasy, but while the humor of the play is spot-on - including a climactic moment that is horrifying to the characters but hilarious to the audience - the Katha/Ryu story is a bit undercooked, as is the game-changing subplot involving Dean and Ellen which is introduced in second act.

But until the rather fuzzy ending, the terrific cast makes this one percolate. Ireland gives another one of her tremendously detailed performances in a role that finds humor in the notion that an intelligent woman who has achieved success in a highly competitive business can find joy and serenity in a lifestyle where advanced thinking is not required. Serralles is very funny as her instructor, pushing the belief that women can find a certain power in being a man's arm piece. Dawson displays an Eisenhower-era, smooth professional warmth and Kim counters with a more casual, hipster cool.

Photos by Joan Marcus: Top: Marin Ireland and Peter Kim; Bottom: Marin Ireland.

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