Lost in the Stars, Encores!

   When Kurt Weil and Maxwell Anderson set out to musicalize the epic novel Cry, The Beloved Country, they strived to tell a musical tragedy, well, that is exactly what they got, though not in the way they intended. The story at hand is quite a story, and longs to be told through music. There is very little good to be had from debating the faults of a 60 year old piece of musical theater, but none the less I'm going to do it anyway.

    I'm going to skip the background info on Weil and Anderson and assume you all know how to use Wikipidia and can find said information on your own if you desire it. I'm also going to assume that if you're reading this that you have at least a passing understanding of who Kurt Weil is, and if you don't, shame on you.

   Early on in the creative process of Lost in the Stars Weil decided that he wanted the entire score to be sung by an ominous choral body that commented on the action of the story through it's music, rather than through characters expressing themselves through music as was the typical musical convention. Some where along the line this plan was scrapped, and songs were added for characters to sing to express their feelings and thoughts, and to further the story along. What we end up with is essentially two separate scores. One is a magnificent choral oratorio, and the other is expressive character driven musical theater songs.

    This, in my opinion, is not the main problem. There are three main problems, one is that the book, which is actually not a bad book, doesn't do well at connecting one song to the next. There are fantastic scenes between characters, but the songs seem to come out of no where, with no organic purpose. This is especially prevalent in the character songs. There is a song late in Act one called "who'll buy" that is a fantastic song, but serves no purpose other than to lighten the mood, and is sung by a character that we've never seen before, and never see again. Meanwhile, the central character of Absolon sings not one note.

   Which leads to the second problem, which is that there are characters who have songs that shouldn't, and characters that don't have songs that should. I've already spoken of one of these instances, the other is with the character of the nephew. He has an adorable character number in the second act, and I wouldn't take issue with him having such a great song, if other characters that deserved great songs also had them.
  
  The third problem, and behind the poor connectivity the most jarring, is that there are many moments that SCREAM for songs that don't get them. The two most obvious are in act II. Absolon is on trial for his life, and the judge asks "Do you have anything to say", Absolon replies "I have only to say this:" and he replies with two short sentences, when he should be replying with a spine tingling plea for his life, a plea for forgiveness, for his soul,  set to music. The other occurs just two scenes later when Absolon's father, who is a minister, is telling his parish he has lost his faith in God. A parishioner asks "What does a man do when he has lost his faith?". One would think this the perfect opportunity for a soaring ballad about the difficulties of keeping ones faith in the face of adversity, however we have no such satisfaction. 

   Overall, I think it's a fantastic score. The book is what it is, which is a drama that fights against being surrounded by all this music.

  Now, speaking specifically about this particular production, it is not quite excellent, but it is very good. Chuck Cooper gives a powerful performance as Steven, who is the shows leading role. His vocals, which are usually wonderful to listen to, are here just alright. He doesn't quite have the power in his upper register that the score requires. His acting choices are genuine and suit the piece perfectly however.

   His supporting cast is quite good. Notably Daniel Breaker as Absolon, and Shirley Boone as Irina. Jeffrey Gumbs as the nephew of Stephen is also charming. The set design is functional, as this is a city centers Encores! concert adaptation. The costumes are effective and evocative of the time and place, which is 1949 in South Africa.

  There is most definitely a powerful story on display that is timeless. There is also the framework of an equally timeless musical. Perhaps some day a smart producer or director will be given the go ahead to rework what is there into something that breathes a bit more organically, and delivers on the promise of the source material. Until then, one can be satisfied listening to the original cast recording, and the many subsequent recordings of the title tune, which does have the power to set it's listener to sobbing, just not over at City Centers.