Yonge Road Theatricals & Goodman Theatre/Life After, e-book, music and lyrics by Britta Johnson, choreographed by Ann Yee, directed by Annie Tippe, CAA Ed Mirvish Theatre, closes Could 10. Tickets right here.
Earlier than moving into the evaluate correct, I wish to categorically state that Britta Johnson is a blazing expertise, even perhaps a genius. Only a few artists can efficiently create the e-book, music and lyrics for a theatre piece, and Johnson is one in all these treasured few.
That being stated, her affecting little musical, Life After, ought to by no means have been reworked into the behemoth Broadway fashion present that it has turn into.
I noticed Life After at Berkeley Road Theatre in 2017, and I used to be profoundly moved. The story is intimate in scope, and supersizing the fabric simply buries it amidst the Broadway glitz and glitter.
Out of equity, nonetheless, a virgin viewers, so to talk, would possibly lap up the obese Life After, and judging by the post-opening response, many have. This current incarnation has been well-reviewed in some quarters and has clearly attracted completely satisfied prospects.
Alas, I’m not one in all them.
The Story
The plot centres round 16-year-old Alice (Isabella Esler) and the grief she experiences after the unintentional loss of life of her father Frank Carter (Jake Epstein).
She is consumed with guilt as a result of they’d had a vicious argument earlier than he left for a enterprise journey — one in all many, as a result of Frank is a well-known self-help guru who has invented the idea of Transformotion, and he’s at all times on the highway.
Frank had known as Alice afterward the day of the argument, and since she was indignant, she didn’t reply. And now her father is lifeless.
Life After is about how Alice copes with the grief and the guilt. It additionally turns into a thriller that Alice has to resolve. Her father’s airplane was leaving at 8 p.m., but his automotive crash was at 8:20 p.m. Why wasn’t he on the airplane?
Alice is so wrapped up in her personal ideas that she is oblivious to the grief of her older sister Kate (Valeria Ceballas) and her mom Beth (Mariand Torres), and so tensions come up between them. Alice does get help from her pal Hannah (Julia Pulo), and her English trainer Ms Hopkins (Chilina Kennedy).
There are additionally the Furies who’re different characters as wanted, however predominantly ideas in Alice’s thoughts; (Kaylee Harwood, Arinea Hermans, and Zoë O’Connor).
The Manufacturing
Johnson’s music is the star of the present.
Life After is a sing-through theatre piece which is much harder to compose than a group of stand-alone songs. Her prodigious expertise permits her to create tuneful music that embraces the temper or second and wraps the characters in a cocoon of gorgeous melodies.
As for Todd Rosenthal’s set, Serafina Bush’s costumes, and Japhy Weidman’s lighting, their designs are what you’d count on in a giant Broadway-style musical.
Thus, Life After is now recognized by an enormous set that may be a cross part of the inside of a home, with a spiral staircase connecting the flooring. There may be additionally a rotating stage that reveals completely different rooms. The myriads of enticing costumes, particularly for the Furies, mirror the world of right this moment. The lighting is huge, which means at all times in your face, as a result of it’s always altering and displaying off particular results.
Ann Yee has offered the choreography that’s actually motion reasonably than dance per se, nevertheless it does animate the stage. Veteran director Annie Tippe has accomplished a journeyman’s job transferring her actors up, down, and throughout the home in significant style.
The unique single piano has now turn into a seven-piece musical ensemble with Johnson’s piano rating ballooned out by Lynne Shankel’s lavish preparations and orchestrations.
As for the performances, Life After is blessed by an uber proficient forged of American and Canadian artists who’re wonderful actors/singers. They’ll actually belt out a music. Notably sturdy are Mariand Torres (Beth the mom) and Julia Pulo (Hannah the pal).
The Ending
Maybe essentially the most egregious side of this over-produced musical is that it goes past its pure ending.
On this expanded model, the tip ought to come because the mom and daughters paint the wall of the daddy’s workplace. Alice has at all times been adamant that nothing of her father’s needs to be modified, however after hesitating, she joins them within the silence — her means of displaying that she is able to transfer on.
Then Kate begins to cry, the primary overt signal of grief that we’ve seen. All through the present, characters have sung about their grief each with anger and sorrow, however now now we have uncooked emotion.
Alice and Beth put their arms round Kate and one another. It’s a stunning and really affective second as they collectively come collectively of their grief.
What follows looks as if overkill. Sure, Alice, accompanied by the Furies, performs “Poetry”, essentially the most lauded music from all variations of Life After.
Sadly, on this incarnation of the present, this scene has now turn into gratuitous. We all know that Alice has come to phrases together with her guilt when she picks up the paintbrush.
Closing Ideas
Regardless of a superb forged and an exquisite rating, Life After, because it has now turn into, is a quintessential instance that massive isn’t at all times higher.
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Paula Citron is a Toronto-based freelance arts journalist and broadcaster who hosts her personal web site, paulacitron.ca. For over 25 years, she was senior dance author for The Globe and Mail, affiliate editor of Opera Canada journal, arts reviewer for Classical 96.3 FM, and dance previews contributor to Toronto Life journal. She has been a visitor lecturer for varied cultural teams and universities, significantly on the position of the critic/reviewer, and has been a panellist on COC podcasts. Earlier than assuming a full-time journalism profession, Ms. Citron was a member of the drama division of the Claude Watson College for the Arts.
