Tall tales of ‘Big Fish’ prove hard to swallow
A witch and a werewolf, a giant and a mermaid: How much magic does it take to make a man feel like a father? A lot.
And, too much to muster in the case of John August and Andrew Lippa’s “Big Fish,” which runs at Stages Repertory Theater through June 26th.
Based on the novel by Daniel Wallace, “Big Fish” is eager to wave a magic wand over a broken relationship between larger-than-life, Alabamaborn storyteller Edward Bloom and his pragmatic son, Will.
It’s even more keen to romanticize a loudmouthed narcissist, otherwise known as a father, who ruins most occasions by seizing center stage, inflicting bad jokes on anyone who will listen and spinning a series of tall tales designed to make a small man feel bigger and more important than he is. At least that is how Will sees his father, and it’s hard to say he’s wrong, in spite of several tearjerking scenes, a deathbed reconciliation and the birth of Edward’s grandson.
In the opening and closing lyric, Edward encourages his son — and all of us, really — to “be the hero of your story.” With such an attitude, and a lot of exaggeration, “You could be a king / Anything you desired, boy / Anything on a plate / All within your power to create.” It’s a common fantasy and a well-meaning lie that we still tell children (in spite of so much evidence to the contrary). Of course, “Big Fish” is a fable and not really instructions for living.
What was not in the power of this production to create, however, was decent and consistent sound, especially in the first act. The canned accompaniment never quite seemed to be at the right level, sometimes blasting out and covering the singers and at other times too murky and difficult to hear. The singers’ microphones cut in and out, encouraging some of the performers to scream their lines. A few too many off-pitch moments and several moments of ear-shredding feedback made for a trying experience.
Also elusive was the quality of magic in “Big Fish” that no doubt attracted madcap director Tim Burton, who made Wallace’s novel into a 2003 film. This production tried to stomp, clap, shuffle, guffaw and scream its way there, but it too often fell short. Director Mitchell Greco’s often clumsy choreography didn’t help, nor did the persistent exaggeration. You don’t need cheap twang, guffawing yokels and straw hats to say “Alabama.”
Like its central character, “Big Fish” is far too much to swallow. So much depends on Will and Edward. As Edward’s frustrated son, Travis Kirk Coombs was more than a touch frustrating. His voice was often thin and nasally, and he rarely was able to seize center stage, preferring more of a wallflower role most of the time.
Kregg Dailey, as the unflappable Edward, was certainly the most confident performer and the one most capable of seizing center stage. He captured the corny humor and the outsized gestures. Like Coombs, he struggled in the poignant, tearful moments to remain convincing, and unfortunately these two actors seemed to lack as much chemistry as the fictional Edward and Will.
Dailey maintained quite good chemistry with many others in the cast, including Coen Ogier, who plays Will’s younger self, and with Holland Vavra, who played his wife, Sandra. Not a terribly strong singer on her own, Vavra was at her best in two touching duets with Dailey, “Time Stops” and “Daffoldils,” as Edward and Sandra fall in love all the way from a circus to Auburn University.
These duets represented a high point for the production, which increasingly ran out of steam in the second half. Edward was confined to bed for much of the second half, and without the bounce in Dailey’s step, the energy seemed to drain away. The songs started to all sound the same as the evening wore on. The script relies on increasingly tall tales to engineer a reconciliation between father and son. While many were genuinely moved by the deathbed scene, it felt forced and more than a little maudlin.
Will feels his father’s stories are a way of hiding from the fact that his world was smaller than he liked. Edward claims that in story and fantasy rest the lion’s share of truth. Who’s right? It’s not clear, even as Will tells his own son tall tales about big fish. Is that what fathers are for? Equally unresolved is an even more painful dilemma: how to feel that an individual life is not small relative to an ever bigger world full of more and more people.
Families are sustained by well-intentioned lies — call them fables. Like fathers, they may do more harm than good, and yet, as in “Big Fish,” we seem to keep on telling them.