99.
THE LAST SHIP
If you’ve been
following the press reports on THE LAST SHIP, the big new Broadway musical with a score
by the estimable Sting, you’ll be aware that it received what are usually
called mixed reviews. Sting didn’t write the book, which is by John Logan and
Brian Yorkey, but it’s inspired by his gritty youth in northeastern England’s
town of Wallsend. As others have pointed
out, the book is the show’s chief drawback, but it has more than enough genuine
heart to support the mostly beautiful, often thrilling score, which (despite
some detractors) is as good as and far superior to most of the new Broadway
musicals of the past two seasons. And the production itself is as fine as they
get, with perfect casting, smashing movement/choreography, splendid acting and singing,
and superb design elements.
Three stories work in tandem in THE LAST SHIP. First, there’s the one about a gritty town that learns its shipbuilding business is closing. The shipbuilders reject the company’s offer to get them other work, and decide to illegally occupy the shipyard. Using the funds being saved for a new church (with the priest’s approval, no less), they determine to build one last ship. What kind of ship it is we never learn, but it would surely cost much more than a single church to pay for it. In fact, it’s only when the ship’s launching is celebrated that the men realize they haven’t given it a name, which is just as unlikely as everything that gets us to this point. (What the men will do when the last ship sails is not addressed.) Thus, much as it’s presented within a musical’s version of rough-accented, profanity-spewing, working class hero naturalism, you have to navigate this musical ship’s conceit with your disbelief billowing like a sail in the wind (or dismiss it all as “a metaphor”). Like other British-inspired tales of resolute everymen banding together to achieve some seemingly impossible goal—think KINKY BOOTS and THE FULL MONTY—THE LAST SHIP commemorates the spirit of camaraderie that insists nothing is impossible if decent souls band together for the common good.
Second, we have the prodigal son story in which Gideon Fletcher (Michael Esper), loosely based on Sting himself, is first seen as a young lad (Collin Kelly-Sordelet) who, fed up with the limitations of Wallsend, leaves behind the young Meg Dawson (Dawn Cantwell), the girl he loves, to see the world and make something of himself. When he returns, 15 years later, having failed in his mission, he tries to reconnect with Meg (Rachel Tucker), but, much as she still loves this gruff yet tender wanderer, she’s engaged to Arthur Millburn (Aaron Lazar). Arthur, an upright guy who wants to marry Meg and care for her and Tom (Collin Kelly-Sordelet), her 15-year-old son by Gideon, is the show’s closest thing to an antagonist, since he works for the company and tries to prevent the last ship from being built.
And third, there’s Gideon’s struggle to come to terms with the memory of his late father, Joe (Jamie Jackson), whose death has brought him home. Joe was a brutal man who often beat Gideon, and Gideon now must also resolve issues with his own son that arise on his return. Arthur, whom Tom calls Dad, complicates matters. Another father also plays a role, the humorously dissolute Father O’Brien (Fred Applegate), from whom Gideon, on coming home, almost immediately seeks absolution, but whose own time on earth is coming to an end.
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| Rachel Tucker, Michael Esper. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
Three stories work in tandem in THE LAST SHIP. First, there’s the one about a gritty town that learns its shipbuilding business is closing. The shipbuilders reject the company’s offer to get them other work, and decide to illegally occupy the shipyard. Using the funds being saved for a new church (with the priest’s approval, no less), they determine to build one last ship. What kind of ship it is we never learn, but it would surely cost much more than a single church to pay for it. In fact, it’s only when the ship’s launching is celebrated that the men realize they haven’t given it a name, which is just as unlikely as everything that gets us to this point. (What the men will do when the last ship sails is not addressed.) Thus, much as it’s presented within a musical’s version of rough-accented, profanity-spewing, working class hero naturalism, you have to navigate this musical ship’s conceit with your disbelief billowing like a sail in the wind (or dismiss it all as “a metaphor”). Like other British-inspired tales of resolute everymen banding together to achieve some seemingly impossible goal—think KINKY BOOTS and THE FULL MONTY—THE LAST SHIP commemorates the spirit of camaraderie that insists nothing is impossible if decent souls band together for the common good.
Second, we have the prodigal son story in which Gideon Fletcher (Michael Esper), loosely based on Sting himself, is first seen as a young lad (Collin Kelly-Sordelet) who, fed up with the limitations of Wallsend, leaves behind the young Meg Dawson (Dawn Cantwell), the girl he loves, to see the world and make something of himself. When he returns, 15 years later, having failed in his mission, he tries to reconnect with Meg (Rachel Tucker), but, much as she still loves this gruff yet tender wanderer, she’s engaged to Arthur Millburn (Aaron Lazar). Arthur, an upright guy who wants to marry Meg and care for her and Tom (Collin Kelly-Sordelet), her 15-year-old son by Gideon, is the show’s closest thing to an antagonist, since he works for the company and tries to prevent the last ship from being built.
And third, there’s Gideon’s struggle to come to terms with the memory of his late father, Joe (Jamie Jackson), whose death has brought him home. Joe was a brutal man who often beat Gideon, and Gideon now must also resolve issues with his own son that arise on his return. Arthur, whom Tom calls Dad, complicates matters. Another father also plays a role, the humorously dissolute Father O’Brien (Fred Applegate), from whom Gideon, on coming home, almost immediately seeks absolution, but whose own time on earth is coming to an end.
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| Rachel Tucker, Aaron Lazar. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
White (Jimmy Nails) and his wife Peggy (Sally Ann Triplett)—are tied together by 20 songs, every one of them tuneful, ranging from lyrical, even heartbreaking, ballads to dirges and stirring anthems, some with a Celtic echo, others in the Kurt Weill vein, and all of them definitely Sting. Several are reprised (the rousingly rhythmic title song, gets four shots), and each is staged with imagination, sensitivity, and beauty by director Joe Mantello or choreographer Steven Hoggett. There are many standouts, but I might mention “Island of Souls,” “What Say You, Meg,” “We’ve Got Now’t Else,” and “The Night the Pugilist Learned to Dance” as among my favorites.
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| Sally Ann Triplett (red jacket), Fred Applegate (to her left), Jimmy Nail (standing center), and company. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
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| Company of THE LAST SHIP. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
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| Michael Esper. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
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| Sally Ann Triplett and company. Photo: Joan Marcus. |
THE LAST SHIP