"Baby, It's Cold Outside"
By Elyse Orecchio (guest reviewer)
On the subway ride over to St. Luke’s Theatre, my nine-year-old lil’ buddy Veronica and I read the 1846 Hans Christian Andersen fairytale on my phone to prep for a musical adaptation of The Little Match Girl.
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| All photos: Michael Blase. |
Happily, as promised in
its promo, Yaya Kids Theater and Ting Wang’s production of The Little Match
Girl stayed true to the story and, to my surprise, ended in the sad tableau
of a little girl who had frozen to death. The audience was sprinkled with young
theatregoers like my date, and I could feel the shock in the room. “Did she
just die?” the girl to my right asked her father and started to cry.
But wait. I don’t mean
to give you the impression that The Little Match Girl is strictly dark
and depressing. There are, after all, charming, swirling musical numbers and
tapping geese. Director Greg Ganakas offers a well-rounded story of heartache
and hope uplifted by magical realism as the Little Match Girl is drawn in and
out of fantasy. The staging offers beautiful visuals such as esoteric ensemble
dancing with matches (L.E.D.-lit—good move) that fade out along with the actors.
The cast is led by the
impressive young Aisling Fiona Fagan, playing a little girl in rags who feebly
attempts to sell matches to support her family. Unable to sell even a single
match, she’s sent back on the freezing streets by her angry, drunken father
(the rich-voiced Tony Mowatt) on New Year’s Eve. There, her shoes are stolen
and she’s shunned by the townsfolk. Cold and exhausted, she falls into
despair.
Desperate for warmth,
she dips into her wares and decides to strike a match. With each match she
lights, she enters a new realm in her imagination. At first, she conjures
images of a joyful Christmas with happy parents, where food is bountiful (this
is where the fabulous tap dancing geese come in) and she basks in her
grandmother’s love. With the strike of another match, she recalls when her
family fell apart: as her mother (sweet soprano Elizabeth Flanagan) fell sick,
her father spent the money she earned selling matches on liquor instead of
medicine. As her husband cradled a wine bottle, her mother reproached him: “When
was the last time you held our little girl like that?”
When she runs out of
matches, the little girl’s fantasies end and she freezes to death. The townspeople
regret having ignored her on the streets. And yes, it’s as sad as it sounds.
However, the production ends on an uplifting note as the little girl is
reunited with her late grandmother (Dayna Grayber).
Joshua Warner’s glorious
set, along with Zack Lobel’s mystical lighting, lend a good deal to the
enchantment of the piece. A sphere hanging at center stage becomes a moon, a
clock, or a window thanks to Lobel’s projections as the actors move about on
wheeled cubes that double as cafe seats and street ornaments. Gail Baldoni’s
lovely costume designs complete the picturesque puzzle.
“Just around the
Corner,” terrifically sung by Fagan, is a standout song by Alastair William
King and Jeff Edmond, and a very talented ensemble delivers the rest of
the lively score, all the more enhanced when Yanni Mextaxes strums his fiddle.
I’m always in favor of a
TYA production that respects children enough to trust that they’re capable of
handling emotional complexity. My young companion, wise beyond her years, said
she was glad they didn’t change the ending because the Little Match Girl goes
to a happier place. With the show running only an hour, there’s time after the
curtain call to take your child to a happier place, like an ice cream shop.
308
W. 46th St., NYC
Through
February 23, 2020
Elyse Orecchio studied musical theatre at Emerson College,
acting at CUNY Brooklyn College, and English Linguistics & Rhetoric at CUNY
Hunter College. She has worked in nonprofit communications for more than a
decade and lives in Sunnyside, Queens. eorecchio@gmail.com IG: @elyseorecchio
