Hadestown

[edjames]

I had to give up a ticket for this one due to illness. I was hesitant about seeing it since I am not a fan of Greek Tragedy, and although I liked “Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812” I wasn't overwhelmed by it . Jesse Green's review in the NYTimes is tantalizing enough to perhaps give it a second try.

 

Review: The Metamorphosis of ‘Hadestown,’ From Cool to Gorgeous

 

All your favorite Greeks are heading somewhere in “Hadestown,” the sumptuous, hypnotic and somewhat hyperactive musical that opened on Wednesday night after its own twisty 13-year road to Broadway.

Eurydice descends to the underworld; Orpheus follows to retrieve her. Persephone spends six months aboveground living the good life of summer and song before returning for six months below with Hades. (He’s her husband.) Hermes, of course, has wings on his feet. And the Fates (at least in this version) are always darting about, minding everyone’s business.

But watching “Hadestown” unfold so gorgeously at the Walter Kerr Theater, I found myself thinking of other Greek characters: those lucky few saved from heartbreak by radical metamorphoses.

That’s because “Hadestown” — written by Anaïs Mitchell, developed and directed by Rachel Chavkin — has itself been radically transformed. What’s onstage at the Kerr is almost unrecognizably different from the version I saw at New York Theater Workshop in 2016. There, it was garbled and precious, too cool for its own good, let alone Broadway.

The gods, or more likely Ms. Chavkin and her creative team, have saved “Hadestown” on its way uptown — via Edmonton and London — by turning it into something very much warmer, if not yet ideally warm. The story is clearer, the songs express that story more directly and the larger themes arise from it naturally rather than demanding immediate attention like overeager undergraduates.

All this has been done with hardly a change to the plot, which cleverly grafts its two myths into one. In Ms. Mitchell’s telling, Eurydice (Eva Noblezada) winds up in hell because of the frost and famine that follow when Persephone (Amber Gray) pays Hades her annual conjugal visit. (Classically, Eurydice just dies of a snakebite.) And because Hades (Patrick Page) now has a thing for Eurydice, it’s the jealous Persephone who convinces him to let Orpheus (Reeve Carney) take her back.

Even Hermes, who doesn’t really belong in either story, has been recruited to narrate, contextualize and kibitz. And why not, if it gives the great André De Shields a chance to slide around in silver sharkskin? It’s he who tells us — in what is now, correctly, the opening number — that what we’re about to hear is “a sad song” no matter how jaunty it sounds. Also that he’s “gonna sing it anyway.”

That’s a pretty good précis of the original myths, but Ms. Mitchell, fascinated by them since childhood, has taken them further as she expanded the material from song cycle to concept album to show. In the story of Orpheus and Eurydice she tugs on the tension between art and domesticity: What good is beauty if you’re hungry? And the struggle between Hades and Persephone naturally becomes a parable of climate change, in which the despoiling of the earth is akin to infidelity.

To make these points, “Hadestown” moves the tale to an earth that resembles sassy New Orleans, with hell a demonic foundry. As such, Ms. Mitchell’s score combines folk, pop and Dixieland with rhythmic work shanties and, for the lovers, ethereal arias. All of it sounds great in swinging arrangements for a terrific seven-piece onstage band.

Other than some reordering, that’s mostly just as it was three years ago — at least on the surface. But if there’s one thing this “Hadestown” is pushing, it’s the idea that what really matters is happening where you can’t see it.

Underneath the hood, a million small adjustments have been made, especially to the lyrics, which have shed some of their pop haze in favor of specificity. The Fates, a girl-group trio, now feel more integral to the action, not just witty commenters on it. And a new chorus of five hunky workers expands not only the sound but also the theme of security attained at the expense of freedom.

Yet the most obvious transformation is visual: “Hadestown” is now performed on a proscenium stage instead of in a miniature Greek amphitheater. Though still high-concept, Rachel Hauck’s single set depicts a recognizable idea of place: a basement jazz joint that miraculously turns into the furnace room of Hades’ factory. This is emblematic of the production’s choice to deliver the story to the audience in as close to the Broadway manner as the material can accommodate.

In truth, it can only accommodate so much. “Hadestown,” even with the heat turned up, is still a somewhat abstract experience, mediated by several layers of narration from Hermes, the Fates and many of the songs. A feeling is as likely to be described as enacted, and Ms. Mitchell develops her larger themes mostly through metaphor. This can get tiring; even though so much of what happens happens beautifully, I began to feel it would be better shorter.

The main story suffers most from this problem: Outside of their arias, Orpheus and Eurydice are blandly written and thus performed. What starts off as a smart riff on “Rent” — poor bohemian girl falls for musician who can’t finish his song — soon becomes vague and merely pretty. Attempts to complicate the characters’ psychology backfire, and their climactic ascent from the underworld, the one thing that worked perfectly downtown, now doesn’t. They merely walk in circles.

Luckily, the second story is direct and vivid throughout. Mr. Page,

, makes an electrifyingly maleficent Hades, even without playing up the Trumpian parallels that have overtaken the material. (One of his songs, written more than a decade ago, is called “Why We Build the Wall.”)

And Ms. Gray, never better, makes something quite brilliant out of Persephone: a free spirit, a loose cannon, a first lady co-opted by wealth yet emotionally subversive. When, as part of the curtain call, she sings the score’s loveliest number — “I Raise My Cup” — you at last wish the show would slow down so you could live in the glowy moment forever.

Along the way there, Ms. Chavkin has probably come as close as anyone could to selling a cerebral downtown story as state-of-the-art Broadway entertainment. Like the sets and musical arrangements, the costumes (by Michael Krass), the lighting (by Bradley King) and the sound design (by Nevin Steinberg and Jessica Paz) are as good as it gets.

The result is just as busily beautiful as Ms. Chavkin’s production of “Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812” — and more coherent. Which almost gets you over the hiccup that a show so fundamentally despairing (“It’s a sad song”) is now so aggressively welcoming.

Don’t let that distract you, though, from its quiet point, buried in a lyric near the end: that we sing the sad song again and again the way we play solitaire: “as if it might turn out this time.”

For “Hadestown” — if not yet for us — it has.

[edjames]

NYPost didn't like it....

 

‘Hadestown’ review: Broadway douses the fires of hell with folk music

For a show about hell, “Hadestown” doesn’t have much heat.

Yes, composer Anaïs Mitchell’s musical retelling of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth, which opened Wednesday on Broadway, sounds pleasant and looks more expensive than it did in 2016 at New York Theatre Workshop. But this classic tale of love — he looks back, she gets trapped in the underworld for all eternity — is still too slick and sterile for us to give a damn about her damnation.

The sluggish musical mostly honors the framework of the ancient Greek tragedy. Orpheus (Reeve Carney) is a poor, dreamy musician working on one great song — Roger from “Rent,” basically. He meets pretty Eurydice (Eva Noblezada) at a bar, falls in love instantly and they get married. Good so far.

And then come some misguided modern touches that rob the myth of its magic. Hell, for one, has been rendered as a mining town, lorded over by a Trump-y mogul named Hades (Patrick Page). Minus any fire and brimstone, Hadestown doesn’t seem all that bad a place to be. Sure, Hades makes his denizens work nonstop, but to the tune of Page’s soothing, deep baritone and up-tempo dance numbers sung by his wife, Persephone (Amber Gray). Enjoy your stay at Club Dead, Eurydice!

Eurydice’s death, by the way, wasn’t caused by a serpent bite: Rather, she “buys a ticket” and hops aboard the train. Her earthly demise is so metaphorical that it’s a non-event. Suddenly, we’re no longer at a musical about battling the gods in pursuit of undying love — we’re at a musical about a hipster moving to Kentucky.

Orpheus, nonetheless, is bummed she’s gone, and with the help of his trusty narrator friend, Hermes (a sassy André De Shields), he sneaks down to Hadestown to retrieve his lady love from the underworld. That’s when Carney wails the show’s best song, “Wait for Me.”

On the whole, Mitchell’s sung-through bluesy score is quite beautiful, if a better fit for a Starbucks than a Broadway theater. Filled with narration and folksy twang, it sounds like a slowed-down “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” However, while her melodies are eerie, the lyrics grate. A trio of bouncy-voiced Fates sing, “Way down to Hadestown, way down under the ground” so many times, you want to shout, “We know where hell is!”

The leads are at their best when director Rachel Chavkin lets them be still instead of forcing them to shuffle around tables and chairs for no apparent reason. Noblezada brings the same soulful voice to Eurydice that lifted the recent revival of “Miss Saigon,” in which she played Kim. Page’s devil is low-key, but imbued with Darth Vader gravitas, and Gray plays Persephone like a boozy madame. The weak link is Carney, last seen here in “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” He has an angelic voice, but his acting is flat and colorless.

His guitarist-on-a-stool bit sums up the overriding problem of “Hadestown,” which turns one of the world’s greatest love stories into a concert at the back of a West Village wine bar.

[Cooper]

Hadestown

 

It won 8 Tony Awards including Best Musical. IMO, all well deserved as it's the best musical I've seen this season.

 

It has a very talented and youthful cast. The singing, dancing, & acting are done to perfection. The songs are written like poetry telling this wonderful love story.

 

Congratulations to Andre De Shields (Hermes) and Amber Gray (Persephone) for winning their Tony's. In addition, I thought the roles of Orpheus (Reeve Carney) and Eurydice (Eva Noblezada) were outstanding. Carney has such a range with his voice and is a very likeable and lovable character. Hades, played by Patrick Page, has one of the deepest voices now on Broadway.

 

The orchestra is on the stage and dressed in costume. They are great!

 

What the show Hamilton did to make American History relevant to modern day, Hadestown does for Greek Mythology.

 

A suggestion: it would be helpful to read a synopsis of the show before seeing it. It's an easy way to refresh your memory on Greek Mythology. However, the show does a thorough job in explaining their role.

 

This is the type of musical you'll want to see more than once.

 

Cooper

[leeper]

I thought the show was excellent and enjoyable, even given the ending. A number of people gasped at the pivotal point - clearly they weren’t up to speed on their mythology. On a related note, I saw Reeve Carney walking hand-in-hand with Eva Noblezada on Eighth Ave the other day in what looked like their show costumes. It was the middle of the afternoon and not close to show time.

[Cooper]

Hadestown cast

 

[Cooper]

The Broadway trailer from Hadestown.

 

[+ nycman]

Saw it the other day. I didn't hate it, but certainly didn’t like it.

 

Hated Orpheus....”last seen in Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark”....says it all.

The child needs to give up the stage before his milk toast blah-ness

destroys yet another show.

 

It was fun to see De Shields slink into his role. Good but not great.

Persephone was a mostly great. Eurydice...well no one really cares

when she dies.

 

The whole overblown, and pretty much irrelevant to the plot, Trump/Wall

subplot takes its toll. Although Hades voice is impressive.

 

One spinning turn table does not great choreography make. The “workers”

seem like a desperate attempt to inject something sexy into a dull show.

At least “the big dude” is nice to look at. “The Fates”...are sadly not used

well at all.

 

The entire show seems like a giant musical Frankenstein of mashed up parts.

Bits of Rent, Little Shop of Horrors, Les Miserables, Book of Moron, The Wiz,

and not one but Two Greek Tragedies are all painfully visible.

 

In the end, too many ideas, too much borrowing, not enough originality or editing.

 

At least they killed Eurydice.

Edited June 22, 2019 by nycman