Review Roundup: New Musical WATERFALL Opens at Pasadena Playhouse

The 5th Avenue Theatre joins with producing partner Pasadena Playhouse in welcoming Emily Padgett (Broadway: Side Show, Rock of Ages), Thom Sesma (Broadway: The Times They are A-Changin', Man of La Mancha), J. Elaine Marcos (Broadway: Annie, Priscilla Queen of the Desert), and Thai superstar Bie Sukrit to the cast of the world premiere of WATERFALL, an epic new Broadway bound musical love story. Performances at Pasadena Playhouse take place now through June 28, 2015.

Waterfall marks a groundbreaking collaboration between American and Asian theatrical artists. The musical, based on a contemporary classic Thai novel, Behind the Painting by Sriburapha, features book and lyrics by Tony Award winner Richard Maltby Jr. (Ain't Misbehavin', Miss Saigon) and music by Oscar winner and two-time Tony Award nominee David Shire (Baby, Big, written in collaboration with Richard Maltby, Jr.) The production is directed by Broadway and Thai theatrical impresario Tak Viravan and choreographed by Tony Award-nominee Dan Knechtges (Xanadu, Lysistrata Jones).

Waterfall is an epic love story set in Bangkok and Tokyo between the turbulent years of 1933 and 1939, as a monarchy falls in Thailand and Japan is on the brink of war. A young Thai student falls in love with the American wife of a Thai diplomat, and the story of their forbidden love parallels history as the new democracy of Siam moves into the vortex of the increasingly anti-American Japan. With a gloriously romantic score, Waterfall is a modern love story of timeless scale.

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

Don Grigware, BroadwayWorld: Waterfall is sumptuously breathtaking with an extraordinary director and ensemble...Under Tak Viravan's clean and meticulous direction, the acting is first-rate. Padgett creates a complex character, showing simultaneously Katherine's loyalty and extreme vulnerability. She sings divinely. Sukrit suits the young Noppon perfectly, making the most of his naivete and longing to be an "American". He is less convincing as Noppon matures from 1932-45, Sukrit is a talented actor/singer with a lot of charm and boyish appeal, who will blossom with more onstage experience. Sesma is wonderful as the disheartened husband who truly loves Katherine, but feels utter helplessness in satisfying her needs. J. Elaine Marcosmakes servant Nuan a truly memorable character...On the cultural side as well as the artistic, Waterfall is a nice surprise. Richard Maltby, Jr.'s engrossing book and lyrics and David Shire's lovely tunes rivet your attention from start to finish. This is an old-style romantic musical that should most definitely have legs.

Jordan Riefe, The Hollywood Reporter: A noted actor and singer in Thailand, Sukrit delivers an earnest, albeit stilted performance. He isn't helped by a reedy singing voice that has him enunciating his way through Maltby's prosaic lyrics set to Shire's score, which is bland at best, but more often cloying. Unfortunately, Sukrit enjoys little chemistry with Padgett, who plays the thankless role of a white goddess idolized by Noppon and his friends. Happily, she handles the part with ease and casual charm, demonstrating a crystalline soprano voice in the early ensemble number, "Dance"...But sadly we're stuck with Noppon, who is feverishly in love with Katherine, despite enjoying limited and mostly superficial conversation with her...we get a one-way trip down lover's lane with a couple that comes across as little more than polite friends...But the show's main culprits are Maltby and Shire, who deliver a generic score and simplistic rhyme schemes to accompany the by-the-numbers melodrama.

Bob Verini, Variety: "Waterfall," the new cross-cultural, lushly romantic tuner at the Pasadena Playhouse, has admirable ambition, visual splendor and patchy dramaturgy. Working from a Thai source novel, stage veterans Richard Maltby Jr. (words) and David Shire (music) seek to explore cultural identity in personal and political contexts, set against a complex historical backdrop. Which is all too tall an order at this stage of the show's development....Shire's score, his most versatile work for the musical stage, sets Asian-tinged melodies against robust percussion and jazz interruptions, all filtered through Jonathan Tunick's cliche-free, period-evocative orchestrations. But Maltby's lyrics are light on the striking metaphors one associates with Eastern verse...Most importantly, our protagonists aren't ready for prime time. The likeable Sukrit, a pop star back home, has a fluid, restrained singing style. But the character he's been handed is nothing more than a goofy bumpkin with an America fetish...Katherine looks ravishing...Yet she's written with irritating timidity. Despite the character's "notorious" past, Padgett is directed toward ice queen, then drab artiste and finally fading swan.

Charles McNulty, Los Angeles Times: With a creative team of such fancy pedigree, one would expect at the very least a polished production. But "Waterfall" is to Broadway-quality musical theater what an amateur watercolor is to a landscape painting hanging in the Norton Simon Museum. This willfully old-fashioned musical wants so badly to be pretty in its scenic frills and sentimental flourishes that it entirely forgets about being true. Stitched together from clichés that scream "cliché," replete with rhymes that a third-grader could guess and set to music so generic that it can seem computer generated, the show recycles Golden Age tropes without renewing their essential ingredient: sincerity....Sukrit is handsomely endearing, Padgett sings prettily and Sesma brings a much-needed dignity, but the actors are sinking in a quicksand of banalities...The Pasadena Playhouse is nobly committed to diversity, but offerings of this clumsy, obsolete, baldly commercial kind only harm the nonprofit theater's standing.

Frances Baum Nicholson, San Gabriel Valley Tribune: So perhaps the first thing that must be said about Richard Maltby Jr. and David Shire's "Waterfall," the new musical at the Pasadena Playhouse, is that though it may have a three-hankie ending, the storyline proves significantly more nuanced. It could have been pure melodrama, but at important moments it chooses not to go there. Placed on one of the more imaginative, fluid sets theater can offer, the deeply episodic "Waterfall" offers up lush music, thoughtful lyrics, and a storyline gifted with just enough cultural insight and edge-of-your-seat tension to avoid slipping into the maudlin. Its characters are well drawn, though in some cases this is as much about the artfulness of the performance as of the script. The event is a visual treat, and in the end offers not just a satisfyingly adult romance but a view of the conflict and coexistence of Western and Asian culture from a distinctly Asian lens.

Katie Buenneke, LA Weekly: The new musical Waterfall is trying really hard...While musicals about history can be interesting, Waterfall is most compelling when it leaves the focus on Noppon and his friends rather than on pre-World War II politics. Despite some pitch problems, Sukrit is utterly winning, skillfully shouldering a musical in his second language and hitting the show's comedic beats with ease. Similarly, his friends (Jordan De Leon, Colin Miyamoto and Lisa Helmi Johanson) are vivacious and entertaining, and their number "America Will Break Your Heart" is probably the most adeptly written song, combining social consciousness with pointed humor. Things take a turn for the dreary in the second act, which feels unnecessary - the story is pretty neatly wrapped up by the Act I finale...The score in the second act also features too many songs that sound like cheap Sondheim knockoffs, which are not the composer's strong suit...Visually, the show is beautiful...Beauty isn't enough to save a show, though, and Waterfall still doesn't feel ready for public consumption...

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Photo Credit: Jim Cox

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