Theater review: Lost in the Stars

by Ed Townley of John Garcia's The Column

Just as Shakespeare has his “problem plays,” so Broadway has its “problem musicals” – works which seem to contain all the right ingredients, but which somehow never quite come together with that flash of magic that creates a hit. One characteristic of the problem musicals – as opposed to outright flops – is that they are so tantalizing; roughly every decade – sometimes more often than that – new directors and producers are lured into trying to solve the problems and give birth to the definitive production that has eluded everyone else.

Probably the two most noted problem musicals are Bernstein’s Candide and Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along. I’ve lost count of the number of different productions of each I’ve seen through the years, each almost giddy in its confidence that it would be the one to break the jinx. The result at best has always been ‘close, but no cigar.’

What makes Kurt Weill so unusual is that all of his American musicals fall into the ‘problem’ category. He will always be known, loved and revived as the collaborator with Bertolt Brecht on the German classics Threepenny Opera, Happy End, Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny and the ballet Seven Deadly Sins. Many of his orchestral compositions are also still performed, and a number of individual songs from his American career – “September Song,” “Speak Low,” “My Ship” – have become classics. But of the musicals themselves – Lady in the Dark, One Touch of Venus, Knickerbocker Holiday, Street Scene – each and every one is a problem piece – impossible to ignore, and almost equally impossible to effectively stage.

Theatre Three and its Executive Producer/Director Jac Alder have a long history of exploring Weill’s early work; they are now concluding their 2008-2009 season with his final musical, Lost in the Stars, based on Cry, the Beloved Country, the moving novel by Alan Paton, with book and lyrics by the American dramatist Maxwell Anderson. This is a brave and strong production; it doesn’t make the musical’s problems go away, but it makes it abundantly clear that even problematic Weill is worth exploring.

Lost in the Stars is set in South Africa in the mid twentieth century, as the first gentle breezes of dissatisfaction and new consciousness are beginning to stir through the firmly entrenched apartheid system that defines the country and its people. It tells the story of the Reverend Stephen Kumalo, a beloved pastor of the black church in the village of Ndotsheni, who ventures into the chaotic and frightening world of black Johannesburg in search of his son, Absolom, who has gone off to work in the mines and has not been heard from in over a year.

A father seeking his son in unknown lands is one of our most primal collective myths, and this production is at its best when it remains linked to that universal energy of hope and dread. Director Jac Alder (who also designed the stark but serviceable unit set) has a clear awareness that it is in this father’s anxious quest – juxtaposed against a very different but no less anguished quest for understanding between father and son in the white and wealthy Jarvis family who live on the hill above Ndotsheni – that the story of Lost in the Stars achieves power and importance. The fates of the two families intersect with tragic consequences for both; and it is in two scenes between the lost and grieving fathers – one in the Jarvis mansion and the other in the “Little Gray House” that is the Kumalo home – that Lost in the Stars finds its heart and soul.

Unfortunately, both Weill and Anderson seem otherwise uncertain about what they are trying to say, which leads to a lot of extraneous distraction. I think perhaps they brought out the worst in each other. They both tended to take themselves, and their work, very seriously indeed. Weill wanted to be seen as a classical composer, and Anderson wrote most of his successful (but rarely revived) plays in tendentious verse. Each of them needed a collaborator – as Weill found in Brecht – who could kick a little butt and throw some earthy rhythms and sassy attitude into the mix. As it is, the first act in particular loses its way several times, dragging in characters and subplots that exist briefly, go nowhere and disappear without explanation or resolution. Even the fates of the two sons seem arbitrary and insignificant. It’s only in Act Two, when everything centers in on the two lost and grieving fathers, that we can see how, for all its problems, Lost in the Stars has a powerful energy to share.

This realization is only possible with the right actors in the roles, and in that regard this production is richly blessed. The masterful Akin Babatunde as Stephen Kumalo is both vocally powerful and emotionally focused; he seems to work from a place of absolute stillness as his character watches events unfold and tries to fit them into his lifelong faith.

As Absolom Cedric Neal is, coincidentally or deliberately, very much his father’s son – equally still and centered at the eye of a personal storm. Their white counterparts are equally impressive, although the excellent Blake Blair has far too little opportunity to flesh out the son who embodies a first shift in old racist consciousness. Terry Vandivort as James Jarvis, the other father, is willing to seem two-dimension and insignificant when we first meet him, only to grow in depth and passion as events unfold.

Director Jac Alder keeps most of the supporting cast onstage throughout the evening as a resident chorus – with the black villagers on one side of the multi-level set and whites on the other (slightly higher) side. The estimable Liz Mikel brings compassion and energy as the chorus leader and in her solo number, “Who’ll Buy?” which all-too-briefly breaks through the overall solemnity. Kristen Smith is affecting as Irina, Absalom’s pregnant girlfriend, although her voice is not well suited to the dissonant demands of her first-act number, “Trouble Man.”

As noted, the set is barren and functional. It creates an appropriate sort of folk-tale ambiance, but the very vital contrast between the worlds of the village and Johannesburg gets lost when the same platforms and palette serve for both. The lighting design by Josh Blann is focused and effective, except for several quick back-and-forth cues at the end of Act One that are distracting. Michael Robinson’s costumes are attractive and appropriate for the villagers and for the more high-tone white folk. But it’s jarring to see the down-and-out men of Johannesburg ’s Shantytown wearing crisp, dazzlingly clean collarless shirts, slacks and matching vests – looking like they’re ready for a night at the clubs in Deep Ellum. A little distressing, and perhaps an occasional rip, would seem to be in order.

The Kurt Weill score is the main reason for the lingering reputation of Lost in the Stars, and it is devilishly difficult to pull off. Terry Dobson and Vonda Bowling have done excellent work with all the cast as musical directors, and their four-hand piano accompaniment works unobtrusively to keep things on track through the long evening.

Theatre Three has earned a solid reputation, multiple awards and audience enthusiasm for its eagerness to produce musicals that are off the beaten Broadway path. If Lost in the Stars doesn’t reach the heights of its recent productions of Caroline or Change and Light in the Piazza, it’s still an important work, well done and well worth seeing.