Performance date – 19 November 2012  (1st preview)

The highly anticipated and newly imagined production of one of the most talked about theatrical experiences from 2004 is finally back in the New York Theatre Spotlight. Bare: the Musical, has a rocking score and a host of troubled teens that tell us about their respective stories and work out different aspects of their personal sexuality from the setting of a Catholic boarding school.

With some very loud and excitable additional music from a new name to the piece, Lynne Shankel along with orginal lyricist, Jon Hartmere, the musicians have embellished upon and sometimes created anew the very popular rock/pop score that was originally conceived by composer Damon Intrabartolo when this show first took shape back in the early 2000’s. The creative team have decided to trend slightly away from the originally through composed “pop opera” with the addition of scripted book scenes that help to propel the story and create a deeper insight to the characters and their stories. If only they would have stuck to this method. It seems that the entire first act has been re-written with an abundance of dramatic exchanges in-between the newly penned compositions, but by the time we make it to Act II, the through composed genre has returned which makes us, the audience, a bit confused as to which type of musical we are experiencing. The newly devised opening number is also a bit cryptic and very heavy. Granted, this is a heavy story, but maybe we need to have a bit of light-hearted “high school” fun at the outset instead of brooding on the angry theme of “A Million Miles from Heaven.” Also, a noted omission is “911 Emergency.” The replacement number (“Hail Mary”) and new direction in casting this role don’t quite capture the element of both storytelling and humor as the original.

Stafford Arima (the director who was critical player in a seemingly impossible task last season; making Carrie work), has taken on the challenge of bringing to life the trials of these high school teens and does so with the greatest of ease. The staging and direction of the cast that has been assembled is fluent, pure and heartbreaking. These people are really going through major identity questions that help to create the adults that they will become. It’s an exciting time in the life of a young person, and his efforts make for a very interesting peek into the process and holds the audience’s attention through every plot turn.

Surprisingly, the role of the Catholic church and the teens’ respective view of religion seems to have slipped away from the story-telling in this version of the tale. Making a few of the choices throughout the very emotional story rather hard to comprehend. There were numerous pre-release articles that mentioned the creative team was trying to “update” the particular events in the show to make the struggles and actions of the characters more relevant to the current times. For the most part, they have succeeded in these aspirations, but taken a bit too much of the focus away from the struggle that many young-people, even today, go through… “My faith and my feelings are very contradictory. What now,  God?” That struggle, which is, essentially the core of this piece is a fantastically theatrical jumping off place, so why do we rarely hear any of the players in this play actually going through the struggle and mentioning God at all? Sure, there are social acceptance issues with much of the subject matter, and this play deals well with those issues, but for some reason, the religious aspect is somehow missing. The song, “You’re Not Alone” is an excellent example of just how we could witness the role that faith plays in the lives and choices of these characters. Instead we get a fantastic power ballad being sung by the Teacher/Nun, Sister Joan who reminds our hero that she is there for him. Unfortunately, we haven’t really had enough character development between these two for the song to ring true.

Anyway you slice this, it is a great evening of theatre.  Go see this show!

—-> DISCLAIMER : I would like to make it known that the preceding post has been written after seeing the first preview of this re-imagined pop musical that was originally staged in 2004 in NYC. This is a show that I have, personally, followed since that time, and have always looked forward to its inevitable return to the New York Stage. I wish the producers and cast continued success with this fantastic story that still has a need to be shared…