Review: KIMBERLY AKIMBO Finds Beauty in the Grotesque at Benedum Center

Good morning, class. Today, we're going to talk about hopepunk. If you're unfamiliar with the term, hopepunk is the opposite of grimdark: rather than an overwhelming feeling of "nothing is going to get better, unless we go through hell and back and sacrifice ourselves in the process," hopepunk says "things can change for the better. People can change for the better. We ourselves can be the light at the end of the tunnel." While initially associated strongly with teen/YA oriented sci-fi animation like Steven Universe or the DuckTales reboot (people, listen to me: drop what you're doing and check out the DuckTales reboot), live-action works like The Good Place and Brooklyn Nine-Nine popularized it. "What if," hopepunk asks, "we weirdos became our own heroes?" In this sense, Kimberly Akimbo may well be the first major hopepunk musical, combining the genre's radical optimism and empathy with its embrace of the odd, grotesque and unusual in the human condition. 

Based on the play of the same name by David Lindsay-Abaire, with book and lyrics by the playwright and music by Jeanine Tesori (which, if you're paying attention, is the same creative team behind the vastly underrated Shrek), Kimberly Akimbo was a surprise Tonys darling and has proven to have legs on tour as well. The musical dramedy tells the story of sixteen-year-old Kimberly (Carolee Carmello), who suffers from a rapid aging disorder not unlike progeria. Sixteen is nearing the end of her life expectancy, so Kimberly, in a body that looks and functions like a seventy-two year old, must navigate high school, crushes and friendship for the first time and potentially the last time. To make matters more complicated, something is very very wrong with Kimberly's family, to the point that chronic con artist and possible serial killer Aunt Debra (Emily Koch) might be the most normal and dependable one. Sound depressing? It's not. The whole tale of illness, family secrets and crime sprees manages to be a sunbeam of whimsy and empathy, despite the sordid subject matter. 

Carolee Carmello is a Broadway leading lady legend, and at times she feels almost too youthful and vital to play an infirm senior-in-teen's-clothing; the illusion of being a sixteen year old  is so intense that we can forget at times that Carmello is a full-grown woman and Kimberly has a genetic mutation. There is a Lisa Simpson "kid with A VERY OLD soul" quality to Carmello's Kimberly, and the small, chipper voice she affects for Kimberly is also not entirely un-Lisa-ish. This is a stroke of genius, as the moments where Carmello slides between Kimberly's small and restricted teen voice, into her full and enormous adult voice (and what is Carolee Carmellos'voice if not famously enormous) give those moments one hell of a punch. Kimberly's smaller-than-life traits make Aunt Debra a perfect foil, since, in Emily Koch's capable hands, Debra is much larger than life. Koch has mastered the grotesque deadpan absurdist school of comedy so strongly associated with female comics like Kate McKinnon and Melissa McCarthy, blending wild physical comedy chops with an unflappable, insociant casualness. Some of the best moments in the show involve Koch as Debra simply... existing in a space she is not meant to exist in, traumatizing high schoolers and taking up psychic space in an uptight world. The fact that she's a con artist and might be a serial killer? Not important! She's funny!

As Kimberly's dysfunctional (in divergent ways) parents, Jim Hogan and Laura Woyasz bring some of the show's darker humor to life. Hogan's Buddy is a man-child forced to mature more than he is capable of, and already more than a bit checked out of the bitter work that is raising a disabled daughter. Hogan finds kernels of empathy and relatability in this irresponsible alcoholic with the low-key bro charm he made famous in the T3 harmonizing videos on Instagram and TikTok. Pattie, on the other hand, as played by Woyasz, is high strung, neurotic and cares too much about everything. She's like Galinda on Adderall, which is fitting since Woyasz is an ex-Galinda. The two of them play exceedingly well off of Emily Koch's louche and casual Debra. 

If you're familiar with Shrek, the musical and lyrical style of Kimberly Akimbo can be described as "that, but more so." The songs swing back and forth between intensely melodic and catchy pop-meets-showtune, and densely lyrical patter/recitative sections which are conversational, unrhymed and packed with stream-of-consciousness verbiage. It's not an easy style to do well and make sound effortless, but the cast, Carmello and Woyasz, take to it like second nature. Danny Mefford's choreography is pretty low key, and works in tandem with Jessica Stone's naturalistic direction; the team prefers to save big choreographic or stylized movement moments to be doled out sparingly, such as the ice-skating finale to Act 1. This economy of movement seems to suggest the play's central thesis, that life is a series of moments, a ride with ups and downs, and not a continual unbroken line. The peaks cannot be neglected anymore than the valleys can, and among the schemes, scams and secrets plaguing Kimberly's family, we leave not on a tragic tearjerker of an ending, but on a moment of hopepunk uplift and optimism. Life goes on, after all, even if we as individuals do not.