William Finn and James Lapine's groundbreaking, Tony Award-winning musical FALSETTOS comes back to Broadway this fall in an all new production from Lincoln Center Theater. Lapine returns to direct an extraordinary cast featuring Stephanie J. Block (The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Tony nom.), Christian Borle (Something Rotten!, Tony Award), Andrew Rannells (The Book of Mormon, Tony nom), Anthony Rosenthal, Tracie Thoms, Brandon Uranowitz (An American in Paris, Tony nom.) and Betsy Wolfe.
FALSETTOS revolves around the life of a charming, intelligent, neurotic gay man named Marvin, his wife, lover, about-to-be-Bar-Mitzvahed son, their psychiatrist, and the lesbians next door. It's a hilarious and achingly poignant look at the infinite possibilities that make up a modern family... and a beautiful reminder that love can tell a million stories.
There are a handful of take-your-breath-away numbers in the new revival of the musical 'Falsettos,' now playing at the Walter Kerr Theatre on Broadway, but none quite so impressive as 'I'm Breaking Down,' a comic wail of despair sung by Stephanie J. Block. Playing Trina, whose husband Marvin (Christian Borle) has just left her for a man with the curious name of Whizzer (Andrew Rannells), Block manages to draw out both the comedy and anguish of this woman's unusual plight - sung all the while she's ostensibly making dinner. ('Let me turn on the gas / I saw them in the den / with Marvin grabbing Whizzer's ass.') Block sends the show to such dizzying heights that it takes the audience a few minutes to recover.
There's hardly a moment in the exhilarating, devastating revival of the musical 'Falsettos' that doesn't approach, or even achieve, perfection. This singular show, about an unorthodox family grappling with the complexities of, well, just being a family - unorthodox or otherwise - has been restored to life, some 25 years after it was first produced, with such vitality that it feels as fresh and startling as it did back in 1992. The achievement seems almost miraculous, because in the intervening years, America has gone through cultural changes that might, in theory, have made the show, with its sweet-and-sour score by William Finn, and its economical book by Mr. Finn and James Lapine, seem a relic.
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