“Fun Home” provides incredible human experience for all audience members
October 25, 2016
“Caption: My dad and I both grew up in the same, small Pennsylvania town. And he was gay, and I was gay. And he…killed himself. And I…become a lesbian cartoonist.”
That blatantly honest quote from the first 12 minutes of the Broadway musical “Fun Home” summarizes its heartbreakingly human plot. Despite its cheery name, this show is anything but upbeat and happy. “Fun Home,” which ran at Playhouse Square’s Connor Palace until Oct. 22, is a masterpiece of modern musical theatre and a must seefor any theatre fan, member of the LGBT community or human.
“Fun Home” is based on Alison Bechdel’s autobiographical graphic novel of the same name. The Tony Award winning Best Musical tells the story of Small Alison as she grows up in Beech Creek, Pennsylvania, Medium Alison as she discovers her own sexuality and the secret that his father was a closeted gay man his entire life and Big Alison as she grapples with her guilt associated with her father’s suicide as she writes her graphic novel.
What I found most intriguing about “Fun Home” was the impeccable storytelling of its score and script. Both the score and book received 2015 Tony Awards, and Lisa Kron and Jeanine Tesori were the first all female writing team to win the Tony for Best Original Score. The way that Kron and Tesori integrate the music so seamlessly into the spoken lines of the show (see “It All Comes Back [Opening]” and “Sometimes My Father Appeared to Enjoy Having Children…”) make the musical read with the intimacy and immediacy of a Broadway style play.
The style of narration was also a high point. Big Alison tied the whole show together with her omniscient narration. The way Big Alison watched her life play out in front of her and spent most of the story on stage passively observing the action justified the jumpy style of plot.
“Fun Home” underwent many changes after its Broadway run, the biggest being the intimacy of the houses it plays. On Broadway, “Fun Home” played at Circle in the Square Theatre, a theater in the round with a capacity under 800 seats. At its first stop on tour the show played the Connor Palace which has more than 2,700 seats. According to Cleveland theater legend Joe Garry’s “Fun Home” pre-show talk, Many fans of “Fun Home” were worried that the immediacy of the subject matter would get lost in larger houses like the Connor Palace while on tour. However, the redesigned set and creative use of stage space and the back wall of the theatre kept the original production’s integrity while adapting the show to play to larger audiences.
One way the creative team attempted to to give larger stages a more intimate feel was to strategically place the orchestra on risers directly behind the action in order. I’m not a fan of Broadway shows putting the orchestra on stage, unless it’s relevant to the plot of the show. Through I understand why they made this artistic choice, I felt the extra bodies on stage distracted from the show, as they were unrelated to the plot and characters
Along with these changes, “Fun Home” also gained a brand new cast for the National Tour. Kate Shindle, Actor’s Equity Association President and former Miss America, shines as Alison. In a departure from the kinds of characters she has played in the past (including Vivienne Kensington in “Legally Blonde the Musical,” Sally Bowles in “Cabaret” and The Mad Hatter in “Wonderland”), Shindle is honest and heartbreaking. Shindle is especially touching when Alison steps into the action toward the end of the show singing the haunting 11 o’clock number “Telephone Wire” with her father. As Bruce Bechdel, Robert Petkoff matched Shindle’s charisma point and game. He masterly kept the audience on the edges of their seats as to what Bruce was going to do next.
Susan Moniz as Alison’s mom Helen Bechdel brought me to tears with her rendition of “Days and Days.” The number, which comes directly before “Telephone Wire,” is emotional and a marathon for even the most skilled singers. Moniz leaves the audience melted in their seats, set up for yet another heart wrenching scene. Moniz’s energetic leadership principally shines while singing with the show’s ensemble of children, Small Alison (Alessandra Baldacchino), Christian Bechdel (Pierson Salvador) and John Bechdel (Lennon Nate Hammond). These children, although young, carried their weight on stage opposite seasoned Broadway performers and definitely let their youthful energy balance out the dark themes of the show.
The most impressive thing about “Fun Home” was how much the show accomplished in just one act. Despite its brevity compared to other similarly successful Broadway musicals, “Fun Home” makes an intensely complicated social commentary and tells an amazingly human story with some of the best modern theatrical music I’ve heard of late. Even though “Fun Home” tells the story of a very unique family, anyone can see a little bit of their own family in the show.
“Fun Home” has been making headlines in the Broadway community since it premiered Off-Broadway at the Public Theater in 2013 and as an avid Broadway fan I’ve been waiting for it to tour and come to Cleveland. “Fun Home” exceeded every expectation and I can’t wait to see how the rest of America receives this intimate gem of a musical in the era of large elaborate musicals like “Aladdin,” “Wicked” and “Hamilton.”
