36. FAR FROM HEAVEN
The premise of Todd Hayne’s 2002 film, FAR FROM HEAVEN, which is the source of this only sporadically interesting musical at Playwrights Horizons, is rich with promise. It is set largely in 1957, during the Eisenhower era, when racial problems were coming to a head during the Civil Rights movement and when homosexuality remained a scandalous and forbidden practice; it also takes the artistic step of replicating the style of Hollywood director Douglas Sirk, famed for his lush, adult-themed Technicolor melodramas, such as MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION, IMITATION OF LIFE, ALL THAT HEAVEN ALLOWS, and WRITTEN ON THE WIND. The musical version faithfully reflects the themes, plot, and style of the film, which starred Julianne Moore as Cathy Whitaker, the epitome of suburban domesticity, Dennis Quaid as her secretly gay husband, Frank, and Dennis Haysbert as Raymond Deagan, the black gardener who befriends Cathy. In Michel Greif’s smooth but superficial production, those roles are played by Kelli O’Hara, Steven Pasquale, and Isaiah Johnson, each of whom offers a fine, if not especially memorable, performance.
For those who don’t remember or
never saw the movie, let it suffice to say that Cathy is the embodiment of
1950s middle-class, white, suburban domesticity, the Betty Crocker or June
Cleaver ideal familiar from TV shows and films of the period. The mother of two
usually well-behaved kids, a boy, David (Jake Lucas), and a girl, Janice
(Julianna Rigoglioso), she lives in a carefully decorated home in Hartford, CT,
that she runs with the help of a kindly black maid, Sybil (Quincy Tyler
Bernstine). She is refined (she cautions her boy not to swear when he says “Shucks”),
soft-spoken, caring, and repressed. Her husband, Frank, goes to business in an
advertising company but increasingly has been coming home late. The family is
taken aback when he is arrested one night for “loitering.” But Cathy ultimately
finds out the hard way about what he’s been doing, and psychological therapy is
introduced, as per the period’s beliefs. Meanwhile, Raymond Deagan, a black man
(colored or Negro in the period’s terminology), with a little girl of his own,
befriends Cathy. He is not only attractive but highly cultured, as demonstrated
in an overreaching art gallery scene where he tosses off an analysis of Joan
Miró’s paintings. But Hartford, even in 1957, seems not far removed from the
deep South in its racial prejudices and gossip soon puts its dent in the
relationship.
One of the serious weaknesses in the story, but an
element that makes it all so reminiscent of 1950s writing in sociologically
oriented potboilers, is the need to make Raymond such a paragon of cultural
knowledge and racial sensitivity. Book writer Richard Greenberg, whose play THE
ASSEMBLED PARTIES was one of the best plays of last season, hews closely to the
movie script, but it would have helped if he could have done something to trim
the abundance of clichés and stereotypes, and find a more original voice in
depicting this bygone era.
To embody the multi-scened
production with cinematic fluidity, set designer Allen Moyer has created a flexible
environment of easily movable scaffolding capable of creating multiple
configurations, from an elevator to a modernistic suburban home with floating
steps, with Kenneth Posner’s lighting enhancing every moment. Scenic units noiselessly
rise from the floor and sink back into it in seconds, and Peter Nigrini has crafted
fine projections to evoke specific indoor and outdoor locations as well as the
seasonal background; unfortunately, they are often blocked from view by the
scaffolding. Catherine Zuber’s period costumes perfectly capture what the mostly
well-heeled, well-dressed residents—especially the women—of a suburban
Connecticut town might have worn, and everyone looks as if they stepped from an
ad in LIFE or THE SATURDAY EVENING POST. Ms. O’Hara’s costumes, with their full
skirts and cinched waists, can’t quite hide the pregnant actress’s growing embonpoint,
but it is to her credit that she races through what must be a tremendously
fatiguing role, with its 19 costume changes, without skipping a beat.
Neither
the music nor the lyrics are impressive, but the music is probably the greatest
problem. As in so many other contemporary musicals (all of which seem to be by
the same composer, whatever the name on the program is), the music is dedicated
to moving the story along and tries to express the emotions and thoughts the
characters are experiencing. This leads to a monotonous quality that often
sounds like heightened recitative, with melody jettisoned for emotional expressiveness.
Yet, far from creating an emotional reaction in the audience, the effect is
cerebral and none of the songs ever wraps itself around your heart and makes
you want to sing it. In FAR FROM HEAVEN, not a single number, if such they can
be called, received more than polite applause when I attended, and many
received none because they were so tightly sewn into the dramatic action that
there was no space for the audience to react.
Ms. O’Hara demonstrates again why she is one of the
most respected singers on or off Broadway. I don’t think her acting as Cathy is
particularly deep or interesting (she overuses the same fluttery hand gestures
when being dismissive), and there is a flatness to her scenes (as there is to
much else on view), but when she sings she always captures your attention. FAR
FROM HEAVEN is far from heavenly but, because of the talent involved and the
intriguing subject matter, musical theatre aficionados will want to see it. As for
everybody else, I have my doubts.
