Review: TONY YAZBECK Grows Up Before Our Very Eyes In New 54 Below Show

Something happened to Tony Yazbeck, something not very nice. But Tony Yazbeck is strong and Tony Yazbeck is resilient, and Tony Yazbeck healed, he recovered, he grew, and what is left standing where he was is a new Tony Yazbeck with a new artistic aesthetic. And both are beautiful.

During his new show that opened at 54 Below last night, Tony Yazbeck outlines for his audience some of the unhappiness and some of the struggle that have drawn his focus for the last year or two, how he was able to confront the matters, and that he has emerged from the battle victorious. He has also emerged as a completely new artist. There is proof that the old Tony Yazbeck is still in there, albeit with a new outlook, a new strength, a new point of view, but where, once, shone a song and dance man, there is, now, a man telling stories in a new way, and with a new purpose. That much is made patently clear, right out of the gate, as Tony Yazbeck starts this eponymous show with a most eloquent and poetic way.

To discuss the story that Tony is telling in his show would be unfair. It would be unfair to the audience who will attend tonight's performance (the last one planned, for the moment), and it would be unfair to Tony. As an artist, a major part of what Tony is doing relies on real time. The gasps and emotions, the reactions and the connection cannot be as substantial to any audience member that has already been given a peek behind the curtain. It would be wrong to shine a light on the actual discussion, on the topic of discussion, on the emotion of the discussion; however, it is absolutely possible to expound on the execution of the artistry on display at 54 Below these two nights in early January of 2023.

Tony Yazbeck opens his show with a song and dance cycle that combines the art forms of storytelling, acting, dance (and while Tony's taps are in place, this goes beyond tap into Martha Graham-land), and the singing of rock and pop music - a far cry from the Gershwin, Berlin, and Styne usually to be heard at a Yazbeck show. Without fanfare or announcement, the Broadway star simply arrives on the scene and begins to weave his tale through music and movement, and deep (and deeply felt) acting choices. Alongside his exquisite music makers (Musical Director and Pianist Jerome Korman, with Noah Chase on Guitar and Mandolin), Tony performs a suite of songs that have been curated to present a paean to life that is both painful and peaceful, and an absolute triumph of artistic achievement. The suite could be performed as a stand-alone piece in a dance concert or storytelling evening - it is original, it is exciting, and it is a side of Tony Yazbeck that we haven't seen before. It is so new that, at first, it is startling. And it is most welcome.

Once the tone has been set by his hyper-artistic opening number, Tony is able to talk to us, and talk to us, he does. The rhetoric of this show is very personal. It's jocular, it's intimate, it's frank, it's honest, it's vulnerable, and it's entertaining. It is also tightly woven into the score that he and Korman have created using the rock music previously mentioned and a fine balance of Broadway, standards, and popular music, none of it chosen to fill a mere desire to just sing, all of it assembled to perfectly pair with portions of the script and highlighted by additional dialogue that springs forth from Tony's feet. They say that musical theater exists because the characters' feelings reach a point where talking no longer suffices and song must be employed, and when song comes up short, dance is the next logical progression. Spontaneously, extemporaneously, and with soul nourishing regularity, Tony Yazbeck's sentences segue from syntax to syncopation and the conversation rises to another height. Indeed, with this show, Tony Yazbeck's artistry and his status as an artist reach a new level. That state of emotional deshabille and the soul growth it provided has elevated Tony Yazbeck to the next natural evolution in his trajectory as a man and as an artist. Factually, at one point during the program Tony remarked that he wanted to "Put myself into my art." Well. Mission quite steadfastly and satisfyingly accomplished. The new Tony Yazbeck show is like a fresh powder of snow or a glowing new layer of skin after a trip to the spa. It's like one of those scenes in a TV medical drama when they show the surgeon doing heart surgery and you can see the organ, naked and beating, inside the chest cavity of the patient. In short: it is stupendous.

Now, as is often the way of this writer, when trying to avoid spoilers, there has been no specific mention of a single song title in this review, nor will there be because the curation of musical material is particularly important in this evening because of the meticulously preserved intimacy of the play. It warrants saying, though, that the three artists on the stage are operating at the top of their game, and it shows, and my, personal, favorite moment in last night's performance is one that will never come again, and that's the way live theater works. During an Ed SHeeran song that had been perfectly and poetically set up, only four lines in, Tony turned to Noah and said, "This isn't working" and the twosome started the song over - except that Tony used his lips, his mouth, his voice, his head to determine a different rhythm for the composition. This wasn't slightly different: it was completely different. What the singer was feeling in the moment didn't match what had been rehearsed and, on the spot, before the audience, this professional musical storyteller re-wrote the story. Watching these proficients at work in real time to make more resonant their art and their destiny was indescribably thrilling. It wasn't like anything I've ever seen before from Tony Yazbeck. But then, the smile Tony smiled last night and the voice with which he sang last night - I've never seen that smile before, and I've never heard that voice before.

What happened to Tony Yazbeck during the pandemic has changed him. He is born anew. And in this show, he is growing up right before our very eyes. This Tony, this man, this artist - he is going to be really, really exciting to watch.

See Tony Yazbeck tonight at 7 pm at 54 Below. Don't run the risk of missing this one. Get a reservation NOW right HERE.

THIS is the Tony Yazbeck website.

Photos by Stephen Mosher; Visit the Stephen Mosher website HERE.

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