Review Roundup: Michael Arden's MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG

Legendary American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim's masterwork Merrily We Roll Along is revisited in a new production under the direction of Tony Award nominee Michael Arden (Spring Awakening), playing at the Bram Goldsmith Theater stage at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts through December 18.

Five-time Emmy Award winner Wayne Brady (Broadway's Kinky Boots), Obie and Drama Desk Award winner and Tony Award nominee Saycon Sengbloh (Broadway's Eclipsed), Whitney Bashor (Broadway's The Bridges of Madison County), Aaron Lazar(Broadway's The Light in the Piazza, The Last Ship), Ovation Award nominee Amir Talai(What To Expect When You're Expecting; Pasadena Playhouse's Can-Can and The Fantasticks) and Donna Vivino (Broadway's original company of LES MISERABLES as "Young Cosette") lead the talented ensemble cast.

Let's see what the critics had to say...

Ellen Dostal, BroadwayWorld: This is a production that chews up your emotions, along with the characters', and spits them out until you find yourself somewhere inside their stories. Whether it's in the I-can-conquer-the-world moment Sputnik passes over the rooftops or in The Shadows where the realization of what compromising your dreams has cost you, you're in there. I think that may be one of the best reasons to see the show, to check where you are on your own path while there is still time to make a course correction.

Jim Farber, Los Angeles Daily News: As directed by Michael Arden (the Wallis' first artist in residence), this "Merrily" rolls along in a manner that consistently gains momentum, dramatic clarity and emotional resonance as it retraces the 20-year partnership between three friends: the composer Franklin Shepard (Aaron Lazar), writer/theater critic Mary Flynn (Donna Vivino) and playwright/lyricist Charley Kringas (Wayne Brady).

Thom Geier, The Wrap: Arden - whose brilliant re-staging of "Spring Awakening" with Deaf West Theatre earned Tony nominations last season on Broadway - comes up with a clever conceit to bridge the gap. He introduces three young ensemble members who serve as shadow versions of the characters looking on and (in the moving final number, "Our Time") taking over for their grown-up selves. But elsewhere, Arden's staging can seem clunky, and the non-singing book scenes (by George Furth) are too often played in an overly broad way, like a parody of bad daytime dramas. Lazar, as a rising-star composer named Frank, and Saycon Sengbloh, as the Broadway actress who lures him away from his first wife before being cast aside herself, are particular offenders in this regard.

Jordan Riefe, Hollywood Reporter: Arden's directing is polished when it comes to blocking scenes on Dane Laffrey's backstage set, which is lined with vanity mirrors right and left, and topped with a low-hanging lighting grid. Eamon Foley's limited choreography helps energize some of the more tedious passages, but director and cast seem to struggle with the notoriously problematic material.

Charles McNulty, LA Times: How did we all get here? Sondheim's music is again the answer. The score keeps drawing audiences to the theater just as it continues to lure directors to try their hand at a musical miracle. "Merrily We Roll Along," however, requires another librettist to rework Furth's already heavily revised book - something Sondheim understandably opposes. Until that changes, we'll have to settle for either concert productions or well-meaning revivals like this one that set a knotty dramatic problem to majestically melancholy music.

Photo Credit: Lily Lim

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